


Boots of Braavosi Leather

by HeyYouWithTheFace



Series: Long Is The Way And Hard [1]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Canon, Alternate Universe - Post-Canon, Back by (semi)popular demand..., Bow-chicka-bow-wow, F/M, First of a series, Fluff and Angst, Foreplay, General smuttiness, Heartbreak, Masturbation, My First Fanfic, Queen Sansa, RICKEEEEEEN!, Ramsay is his own warning, Sansa finds a sack, Slow Burn, Stannis the Mannis, The Greater "Good", Time t'get my Risk-head on, WAAAGH!, buh-bye!, cry havoc and let slip..., darkness before the dawn, fine fine have yer damn fluffies jeez..., fuck me this is becoming a monster, get mah' Machiavelli on..., my sincere attempts are paying off!, my sincere attempts to make SanSan shippers cry, one step forward and two back, oooh is that another pairing I see?, sneaky-sneaky catchy-monkey
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-11-26
Updated: 2015-06-19
Packaged: 2018-02-27 03:45:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 42
Words: 229,710
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2677811
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HeyYouWithTheFace/pseuds/HeyYouWithTheFace
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Hound did free bird from high stone cage,<br/>Carried through danger she who gentled his rage,<br/>To her home, her house, her land now torn,<br/>That she may forge from usurpers' strife,<br/>A birthright renewed, a shackleless life."</p><p>I had a dream. Of writing a short, simple, three-chapter oneshot about heartbreak befalling Sandor and Sansa, inspired by "Boots Of Spanish Leather". It was going to be tear-inducing and painful. And short.</p><p>Then this happened.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [swimmingfox](https://archiveofourown.org/users/swimmingfox/gifts), [cherubicwindigo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cherubicwindigo/gifts).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My first fanfic since... gods, probably one about GTA3 (please, please don't ask) when I was wee, and I'm so terrified-happy to be here and posting. I can't wait to start adding to the beautiful body of work you guys have already made. 
> 
> Cheers in advance and without reservation to Jillypups, swimmingfox, cherubicwindigo, BlackForestt, TheCakeConundrum... and a whole buncha' other awesome scribes. Please feel free to savage my tender flesh with your constructive criticisms: you raised the bar like The Mountain to a dwarf, but I'm intent on rising to it. 
> 
> Enjoy!

It was Stranger that did him in. Bloody treacherous old nag.

He paid for passage across the Narrow Sea but when the raisin-skinned captain saw his horse, he'd shaken his head.

"What?"

"No space for that thing, my friend," the man had said with that slippery, sliding accent, shrugging as if him wasting two buggering days riding was a patter of rain on his head, "Have to wait."

The rider leaned forward, letting the Braavosi get a long, thorough look at his face. A flurry of feelings fled over those thick lips, those wide brown eyes, that heavy brow and tanned jowls. He knew every one of them. He even guessed which order they'd pass. When he spoke again, his voice was the low, rasping scrape that had once terrified hard men into submission without a hand ever being raised.

"I've fucking paid you, you greasy little bastard. So unless you're looking to cheat me-"

The captain was stuttering and stammering his explanations by the time his hand closed around the sword at his hip, vomiting words of frantic reassurance. Even in the crisp cool of White Harbor, his face was shining slick. The rider took in his fear and felt embers again; a low growl of satisfaction that he barely kept from his throat.

"No-no-no, my friend! I, ah, there is-is another, ahem, another ship. But, ah, captain is, ah..." An absurd attempt at good-humored camaraderie bloomed nervously on his face, followed by a shrug and waggling black eyebrows. "... occupied. At, ah... the tavern? With... women?"

Sandor Clegane - no _ser_ , no _lord_ , thank you very fucking much - breathed out hard through his nose as if imitating his steed. _Well_ , he thought, _isn't that bloody fitting?_

"Then go get him."

"Ser-"

"Stick to 'my friend', even if I'm fucking not."

The Braavosi captain silently cursed this melted man by all the gods of his home and the strange gaggle these Westerosi seemed to worship, but kept his face bobbing and smiling.

"My friend... he is deep in wine, and women. Long has he been from land, and I fear it will be a few nights before he has his fill. As soon as he is, I will take you to meet him. His brigantine will suffice for your animal, I am sure. But mine?"

He gestured behind his back to the low sloop rocking gently at dock, a clutch of seamen snatched up from all four directions gawping at them. _No_ , Sandor corrected himself, _at you_. His lips curled back, moreso on the ruined side of his face, seeming to expose his teeth all the way back to his molars, and ight away every man had an urgent duty to be diligently attending.

"A fine vessel for... _discreet_ commerce, aheheheh..." Not a hint of a smile, nor a softening of the eyes. Just that same hard, cold stare like storm clouds marching across the sky. "B-But not livestock. I am truly sorry... my friend."

Sandor snorted again. He bloody doubted that. Fucking Braavosi. He knew he had to get used to them, though, and he hadn't mentioned the horse. He'd assumed the man he'd overhead in the tavern days before had an adequate vessel. How hard was it to ship a bloody horse, after all?

"Which tavern is he in?"

"Se-my friend, I would not advise dist-"

"You can shove yer advice up yer bunghole," The snarl was back, bidden to his tongue with nary a complaint. Gods, it was so familiar. Like slipping your fingers around the sword you'd trained with, until it became naught but your own skin, honed and hard and lethal. "I'll take back my coin and get myself a drink. Tell your friend he'll have custom."

He held his hand out and watched the Braavosi count out the five coins from his purse with exaggerated care, as if this demon would skewer him if his fingers dipped too fast. Sandor raised the hand closer to him and pushed them around his palm with his purse. These new stags... well, they weren't stags, for one. Now they were "Stallions". Something about the queen not wanting sigil of her family's usurper on her realm's coin... and, it was whispered, a sop to her deceased first love.

A _Dothraki_ , apparently, and didn't _that_ just get the maids and septas shuddering with scandal.

Sandor could have cared less, but the corner of an eye twinged as something had twisted his guts. He wanted no tales or murmurs of affection that day. He checked the coins again and pocketed them, turning Stranger round with a click of his tongue behind his teeth.

The stallion had barely cantered a dozen steps before his "friend" cried out: "Wait! Who shall I say looks for him?!"

"Tell him what I look like," he said without turning around, grim smile shorn of humor crossing his lips, "Should make it simple..."

 

++++++++++

 

 

He'd nothing to do once Stranger was in his stables, and that made his hands restless and his thoughts unbound. Just as he'd feared.

The docks beyond the dirty window were a constant whirl of industry, and he tried to lose himself in that. White Harbor was almost exactly due west of Braavos; a flood of finery and plainer cargo rushed into it every day, and with them came their strange bearers.

Men in colors to garish that no Westerosi would even touch the fabric, not even if he were reduced to his smallclothes and penniless. Women who rarely left their vessels but dressed in daring silks that had the pale, dark-haired local boys stealing looks at them for hours, flushing every time an almond eyes flickered their way. Sandor's head almost hurt from that mewling, cackling lingo they babbled in, constantly shouted or called out from ship and sail and mast and pier. A barrage of spices and scents and stenches wafted around the piers, thick enough to cut through.

And that wasn't even throwing the locals into the mix.

"What'll it be, darling?" He looked up, hair falling from the devastated side of his face as he did, and suddenly he was a sorcerer again. He could see the future. He could see that sly, hopeful smile was replaced in a blink, crushed into a disgusted grimace that went with her wide eyes.

And that's just what happened. Years before - but not as many as one would think - he'd have bit and snarled at her like his namesake, just for the temerity of acting like... well...

_Everyone._

_Liar._

"Wine." He said, resignation in his voice, slapping down a couple of coins onto the table. "By the flagon, girl, and don't let it run dry."

"Y-Yes, ser!"

"And I'm not a _fucking_ ser!" He hadn't meant to shout the last word, but by the time she'd skittered away like a frightened spider, it was too late to... do what? Apologize?

Sandor frowned out of the window and wondered how it had come to such thoughts. Had it really been so long? Had he really changed so much? Had she-

There it was again - deep, twisting in his side and then hollow and cold. His breath came out ragged like he'd been stabbed.

Gods... what a fool he'd been.

 

++++++++++

 

Growth was often slow, she had learned, but restoration could be even slower... and more painful.

Every step and stone of Winterfell had been burned into her mind ever since she had opened her eyes. The gardens and the baths. The hearths and the stables. Her bedroom and the towers and a hundred other places that she was sure she would never forget. The gargoyles. The godswood. In every place and in every memory, there she was joined by sibling or parent, in joy or in sadness or in anger.

When she returned and saw what the Bastard of Bolton and his Leech Lord sire had done to her home, another part of her slid away and died. She'd closed her eyes and willed the tears not to fall, though she could feel them welling in the darkness, the shaking in her arms-

Then his hand was on her shoulder. A murmur in her ear, not gruff nor crass. She breathed in and felt her backbone harden, as if borrowing strength from that big mitt on her. She nodded with all the finality of the Queen she would one day become, and turned to those that had followed her.

"We shall rebuild. Every room. Every roof. Every tower. Every tree felled and gate smashed. The North remembers..." She'd looked around at the skeleton House Bolton had left her... yet she smiled. "... and so do I."

Ten years had ran by her eyes fast as scampering children, but now she could walk through the godswood again under the shadow of Wintefell and feel some faint shadow of the girl she'd been. The family she'd had. She sat under the branches of the last weirwood and peered up into its carved, bleeding face. Years had not softened nor worn her beauty. Sansa Stark the girl had become a woman, strong as her father could have hoped, swift of mind as her mother had prayed for.

Her lips quirked as she remembered him. _Life is not a song._ He'd muttered that to her before, when she still believed that her life would be just like a bard's larking, bright with soft edges and shining heroes and you would always know who the bad men were. Such had not been the case... and without him, she would never have learned.

The lady's brows knotted. Where was he, anyway? She had not seen him for... gods... had she really been so distracted?

"Erin?" She said at the first maid that passed, a stout gil who curtsied as she approached. "Have you seen Clegane?"

The girl had looked at her goggle-eyed for a moment, as if she'd asked her if she'd seen that purple dragon a moment ago. A prickle shivered on the back of Sansa's neck and-

"I... Your G-Grace, he's been gone for two nights now."

For a long moment - or an hour, or a season, she really didn't know - Sansa stood there, staring. Her heart remembered to beat again and her breath came out choppy. Moments before she had been as composed as like and ordinary, and now... now...

"Wh..." She never stuttered anymore. She held court and ratified treaties and Willas valued her for more than just her beauty and her grace. But now the words had to be lashed together, fear barely keeping from fraying them to sobs. "Where has he departed to?"

"Well..." The maid shuffled awkwardly for a moment, but she was but smallfolk and this was the Queen in the North speaking to her. "... he did not say, Your Grace. But ..."

Another pause. Another guilty look, like Sansa was dealing with some child stretched on the rack of her parent's glare to betray a trusted comrade. Well... bugger that!

"Out with it, girl!"

"S-Sorry, Your Gr-"

"You wiped my son's arse, Erin!" Sansa snaps, face going red as her temper and she hears his wry chuckle in her ear. Ah, there's the bird that grew to hawk and then to wolf. "Spare me the title I hear a hundred times a day and tell me!"

"South!" Erin all-but-squeaked, eyes downcast. Sansa made a note to feel wretched about that later, but not now. _Now_ she needed information. "Young Kip, the gamekeeper's boy, he said that he'd seen-seen Clegane on-on Stranger. On the road south."

Sansa looked away and her eyes unfocused for a moment. From Winterfell there was only the Kingsroad, that great slash of smooth highway that split the country like a greatsword's swing. But another thought struck her, and she'd long learned to listen to those querying voices.

"On the road?"

"N-No, ma'am." She at least attempted a title, but wouldn't waste an extra half-second on her proper one. Sansa was oddly proud of her. "Along the river."

South. Along the river. Without a word or a letter or an audience. Shaky confusion crystallized in her chest like she'd been thrown into a lake north of the Wall (if it still stood, anyway). Gods... she had been so stupid. So _blind_. So wrapped up in her duties and used to his presence that when he'd gone-

Left. He'd left her alone.

"I'm sorry, Your Grace..." The words slithered into her ears though the wool jammed into them. She blinked and realized Erin was still there, basket of wet laundry in her shaky hands, fidgeting with her pudgy fingers around the middle handle. She looked ready to cry and Sansa felt that swell of warmth rise again; lions and mockingbirds and flayed men and worse had tried to crush that out of her, with words or with blows, and all had failed.

It was why she even knew Erin's name.

"I thought that you... I mean, since he's your sworn shield-"

"That I would know, yes... yes..." No point worrying the girl. Instead she placed a hand on her shoulder and drew deep into her memories. The mask of Alayne Stone rose again: serene and polite and useful. Sansa felt her skin crawl like he was touching her again, caresses masquerading as concerned pats, but she needed Erin to be calm. She did not want her scared, and if that meant she had to reach back into her deceptions, so be it. "Thank you, Erin. I only wished to speak to him. You may go."

Erin did, and Sansa spun on her heel the moment she was around the corner. A quarter-hour later she and a handful of bannermen were pounding down the river road and heading south, the Queen in the North heedless to the cold wind that bit and whipped her pale face. Willas was in the south, tending to affairs in Highgarden like the tangled human greenhouse she knew it was, but one look on the warring expressions on her face would have warned him against trying to stop his lady wife.

Sansa was going to White Harbor, sure as the stars followed the sky.


	2. Chapter 2

He knew they would freeze without shelter, and more besides.

The journey from the Eyrie had been trip-wire taut the whole time: abandoning the roads for wood trails and wilderness, living off rabbits and pigeons, distrusting all and hushing, stilling like cursed children from a tale whenever they heard a noise. All men were their enemies, that's what he'd told her. Until she was within the walls of Riverrun and in the arms of her mother's kin, every face they saw bore eyes that could betray them. It was just a matter of coin and opportunity. 

"Then why have you not?"

Sandor had looked over at her with his customary scowl, but got barely a blink in response. He told himself she had simply grown used to him, even with half his visage a scorched husk, so savaged by his brother that bone shone like ivory through his jaw and curious eyes could see burnt tendons pulse and twitch on occasion, no longer hidden by skin. But Sansa took in the horror he lived with and he saw no fear or disgust in her; mayhap a buried dash of pity, which would have been enough to send him snarling before.

No longer. The Hound was many monstrous things, but false was not among them. He could no more harm her than he could slay a kraken with a soup spoon, and would not threaten so.

"Maybe I know there's more waiting for me at Riverrun."

"Lannister's always pay the most," she said simply, "You know that."

"And they want my head, too, remember?"

She took a step closer to him, a cool boldness in her eyes he hadn't noticed before. Some unease wriggled in his guts at the sight of it. Not for what she'd had to become; but for what she'd had to give up to do so.

"Then the Boltons. Or the Freys. The Tyrells-"

"Too far south, you know that-"

"And _you_ know what I mean, too." She breathed in deeply as if preparing herself for a leap off a cliff. Sandor couldn't look away, even as that unease grew a voice and whispered a warning. "You came for more than gold. More than reward."

"We don't have time for your blather, girl-"

"Do I stand a girl to you, now?" Her words became cold and Sandor felt... gods... how long had it been since he'd felt sorrow for another? Barely fifteen years walking the world and the little bird had that deadly calm about her, rising like steam off ice. Even by the diced shards of moonlight through tangled trees, he could see her porcelain face. Distant. Aloof. "And we have nothing better to do."

"Bollocks, we could be _walking_ -"

"And talk while we walk."

Sandor's voice rose even as he voiced the next point, then twice-over as he stopped to growl: "And have everyone for a mile around know there's a man and _girl_ wandering the fucking woods? Keep yer trap shut and follow me. I wanted questions I'd've taken a fucking septon..."

He heard the indignant rush of her breath as he turned around, crushed a smirk as he imagined her nostrils flaring in annoyance. Well, let her be annoyed, as long as she was quiet about it. They had a ways to go.

Then the sky exploded.

 

++++++++++

 

His eyes opened with that midnight lightning but morning sun found him instead. Hmm... maybe not _morning_ , judging by the flagons on the table next to the bed. Sandor blinked away the memories and felt his heart slow down with his breathing. The big man screwed his eyes shut and forced the heels of his palms against him, as if he could somehow tear out that night and forever rid himself of her.

_Gods, who am I fucking fooling? If not for her I'd've got myself killed long before now._

Gulls called out beyond the window. Sailors seemed to answer them. Beneath his feet there was already ale flowing and drunken laughter jabbing up through the floor. Sandor crossed his arms over his chest and studied the ceiling. He'd have to go down at some point, inquire about that damned drunken captain with a more "fitting" ship to take him across the sea. He'd tend to Stranger personally. Not bloody likely was he going to trust some greenboy with that beast. He didn't need the hassle of some gormless youth having a chunk taken out of his face because he brushed too hard or too swift.

But his feet stirred only as far as the wash basin. So close to leaving, and all the memories he'd so carefully buried rose to the fore of his mind, formless arms trying to drag him back from his chosen path. The splash of water across his face did little to dispel them. He braced his hands on the edge of the table and glared at his reflection in the dirty mirror. Cheap glass, riddled with imperfections... still it did nothing to hide his hideousness. His own room back ho-back in Winterfell, was without one by his order. What point was there in fussing over his appearance when he looked like some nightmare given flesh? He could swaddle himself in silks and fine furs and still, still, _still_ he would be naught but a monster in every pair of eyes.

A whole lifetime of people turning from him. His hands gripped harder until the knuckles whitened. So many faces who'd ignored him, crumpled in shock when they took in every charred inch... his brother's undying testament, reaching out beyond his well-earned grave to continue terrifying the world. For the longest time, Sandor thought himself a shade. A spectre, always apart. Now he stared at Gregor's work and he felt the anger rise again, that bottomless rage that had served him so well in battle, until his vision was black and slathering and wanting the whole world to pay for what-

He breathed out, almost without a sound... and some of that hatred seeped like wine from a leaking flagon. In an endless night, a single light shines brightest. He had been drawn to it almost unwilling. At first he'd sneered and japed cruelly, as if by breaking that kind courage he would prove himself right. But she had not broken. In the face of all his hateful mocking, his little bird had not flown from him. 

 _No. You flew from her. And she traded one bastard beast for another, far more subtle in his tortures._  

Sandor's hand reached up slowly... traced the ruined portion of his face from his scalp... fingers splayed so they skirted the blackened hole he had for an ear... riding and dipping over tendons and stiff, shining flesh... until they came to his jaw, where no amount of beard or stubble could hide the portion of his skull the fire had left for display. Light... so light... but never as light as she had been. 

His eyes grew distant, and before he knew it, he was back in the forest as thunder and slashing white fire shook every tree.

 

++++++++++

 

"Fuck the gods and all their beggars, we're in bloody luck."

At first they'd tried to ride it out: quite literally. He'd heaved her on top of Stranger before the first fat droplets hurtled to the forest floor, leading the stallion along with his hood up. He hadn't spared a thought to his own comfort, not with a girl of not even six-and-ten to care for.

_Care for? You mean "escort"?_

The masterless Hound had growled at the unwelcome voice, but it was dwarfed by the roaring thunder above them. Giants warred in the sky and each clash of heavenly arms crashed over the trees down to the ground, and their blood as water poured down with it. He loaded her with their blankets and whatever else they could use, but before long they were sodden, too, heavy and useless. He could feel her trembling even through Stranger's flanks, and when he looked back at her-

She was ashen. Shivering so hard her features nearly blurred. Hands clasped together under her throat, eyes narrowed by the lashing rain but still desperate, pleading.

He reached for her hands, one callused paw more than enough to cover both of hers... and they felt as cold as stone to his touch.

_Keep this up until morning and you'll have her mad with fever or worse._

That was all the incentive he needed. Just that possibility, that single fearful flash of him standing over a fresh grave that would pull out his guts without a mark and drive him to his knees. No. He couldn't let that happen.

"We need to get out of this!"

He bellowed over the storm but she couldn't hear him. _Yes, and it was so bloody useful, anyway._ Cursing all and always under his breath, Sandor had marched on, ignoring the rivers funnelling between the gaps in his armor and soaking his own skin. He glowered and squinted through the darkness, lit up for frozen moments by the lightning. Nothing but tree trunks and branches, not enough leaves to protect them-

Then he saw the mound. A lump in the darkened landscape, rising unnaturally half-a-league distance. He spurred Stranger on towards it, daring himself to feel a shred of hope.

It was a hut. Rudely built from mud and branch-lattice, probably a hermit's home or a poacher's hideaway. The door made of branches bound with twine had no lock, and he opened it with his dagger ready in the other, shaking the rain from his eyes like a dog first. 

Nothing but darkness. No sound, no smell of fire or sweat or roasted meat, no token of light. The Hound whirled and reached up with both arms, taking her in them with his dagger still in hand, and it felt like it was in his own breast as she rested against him like a sodden block of ice. 

"It's alright, little bird," he said as he stooped low through the door, tiny hammering cacophony finally ceasing. "Lie down, I won't be long."

He spoke as if trying to placate a skittish mare, and at that thought he went back outside to Stranger. The lumbering warhorse regarded him calmly, though it was his own turgid expression he saw in those brown eyes. He couldn't take him inside. The hut was barely big enough for two. Instead he hitched him to the largest tree he could see, with the ost branches above to divert some, any of the deluge. 

"Won't leave you, y'maungy bastard," he said softly into his ear, "But the little bird needs me."

A twinkling later he was back in the hut and damn-near breaking the door to get it closed as tightly as possible. Images of a tree struck by lightning crushing their little hovel played stark and frightening, but Sandor could see no other option. It was here or the open, and the open was-

The girl coughed in the darkness, a sneeze following a moment after, wet and raw. Sandor felt around the gloom until he found the fireplace, scratched out in one corner and the ashes...

_Long-cold. No-one's been here in a while. All the better._

She sneezed again and he felt split in two even as he bent to find kindling. He wanted to rub her hands within his own until that soft warmth returned to them. He wanted to peel those soaking rags off her and cover her in fresh, dry blankets. Usually his breeches would shift and shrink at that thought but in that moment, the two of them trapped under a storm bent on drowning the world, his thoughts had crystallized into something far simpler.

_Protect her. Keep her safe. Keep her warm._

It seemed like an age before his blind hands could get the embers glowing in the tiny hearth. Inch by inch, the hut becomes clearer to him, shapes and contours and objects revealed... like the tinder box and flint sitting right next to it. Shoulders like boulders slumped.

"Oh, fucking _typical_!"

"Wh... What is...?"

Her words are low, but at least the tremble is beginning to leave it. Sandor turned to her, and thought as he looked on her that this might have been the one time he had been with her and she not endure his face. 

"Bloody flint and tinder, right next to the hearth! And me scrabbling around like a bloody boy in the dark..."

A laugh. A single peal, like a distant bell, and Sandor's smile came unbidden. He could have listened to that sound until dawn came and then the sun plunged down again. Even the fury of the storm could not drown it, and he saw her shaky white smile under her hood. 

"I thought... dogs could... se-see in the dark?"

A harsh bark and he stepped to the bed, so broad and tall that he threw her into shadow again when he crossed the firelight. He looked down on her, face hooded in darkness.

"'fraid not, girl."

"I... I told you, I am n-"

"No girl, yes, yes, I heard. You would prefer 'little bird'?"

Another laugh, and she rose slowly as if she were growing from the rough straw mattress. "You made a rhyme."

"I..." He harumphed, flummoxed for a moment. He'd not done that since his maester was rapping him across the knuckles as a lad. "Yes."

Shifting and shuffling and awkward little noises, and he realizes she'd trying to relieve herself of the dripping cloaks and blankets. He reached down and helps her, squatting lower to he can take each one and throw them before the fire, growing steadily as it catches and devours its first meal (which was essentially anything to hand Sandor could throw into it). 

"Y... You need to... take your armor off."

"What? Why?"

"Y... You'll..." Her lips pressed hard and white and Sandor had to struggle not to rasp a laugh. "You. Will. Get. A chill."

"Feel better, saying all that properly?"

Sansa's eyes narrowed and as they shrinked to slits, his own smile widened. 

"Now you chose to mock me? When I am a bedraggled rat in a hut?"

"You're no rat."

"You're no _dog_ , and yet here we are."

The smile slid from his face. Years of curses and insults roared to the fore and the moment was fractured by their intrusion. "I have _always_ been a dog. Always will be. Don't think that'll change, girl."

A fresh sadness filmed her eyes but she looked away before he could truly see it. Instead her voice repeated, small but insistent under the stringy curtain of wet red hair, now dark as weirdwood leaves before her face. "Please take your armor off."

"I'll be fine."

"And if you are not come the morn?"

"Takes more than falling water to kill me, girl."

"A dead man is of use to no-one," she said, and Sandor feels a chill shuffle down his spine. Hearing his little bird even mention death, mouth such a bleak view... he finds he cannot refuse her. Of course, it helps that she's right. "And if that's where your stubbornness leads, then-"

"Fine, fine..."

He could feel her eyes on him as he unbuckled the half-plate and mail, just a wet little bundle of quiet flesh on the mattress. His eyes kept flickering back to her as he went about his task, until finally he locked eyes with her and-

"Stop staring, girl. It's just armor."

"I wasn't staring at the armor."

Being trapped in a rainstorm didn't seem to bad. Sandor's eyes widened and his jaw clenched, hard enough for his teeth to sound like scraping marble. 

"Don't fuck me around, girl," he said with a snap to his voice, that growl she'd come to both dread and depend on within the Red Keep, "Women don't stare at me, so I doubt fool girls will-"

"Stop calling me that!"

The fury, pent up and blasted out like a cork from a bottle, stuns him into silence. Never one to raise her voice, was Sansa, and now she's on her feet even as he towers a clear foot over her head, chin tilted up to look him in the face. Full in the face. Her own flushed and pink, jaw as tight as his own with outrage. Sandor glared down at her, sting of her last words, the toying insult he read in them, not allowing him to back down.

"Oh?"

" _He_ called me that!"

"He?"

"The man you took me from!"

"Took you?! As if you were a purse to be stole? You'd prefer I take you _back_?"

She laughed, a sound so harsh and mocking he would have sworn it fell from his own lips. But instead it was from her, arms crossed under her breast, and Sandor only noticed then how her clothes clung to her close and clear as dew to grass.

"You wouldn't. You _couldn't_. You'd sooner die than return me to one you knew harmed me."

Now Sandor's face flushed, teeth showing, bared and furious. How fucking _dare_ she?! Fucking presume to know what he would do. "You're fucking mad, _girl_ , if you think you know me."

"Better than anyone, I'd say, _ser_."

" _Don't_ call-"

"Then don't g... gir..."

The word died on her lips, almost like a gargle, and all flight fled as her hand went up to her forehead. Sandor's rage had frozen him, poised for... something, he didn't even know, and yet when she swayed on her feet-

-his arms caught her and gathered her up against his tunic, looking down into eyes frowning in confusion.

"Hell's fuck, Sansa, you're wet through and sodding exhausted."

She smiled up at him, half-asleep already, that great swell of righteous anger burning itself out and leaving only tired bones in its wake. They stood there, lit by the meagre flames, both seeming blind to the fact they were embracing. His arms wrapped under hers and at the small of her back. Her own spread wider to grab his forearms.

Nothing but rain-worn cloth and the rain itself between them. So close they were breathing each others air. They stared - one up, one down - and their gaze seemed bound by all the possibilities they'd dared not name nor thought would come to pass. Sandor could... feel her, now. The softness of her skin, how smooth she was even through her wet dress, like fine, living porcelain. His fingers moved the merest amount to seek more of her, and her lips parted by the same token.

Sandor's heart was between his ears now, pulsing loud and dire and all his dark past screamed at him to let her go, set her down, end this before one of you-

"S-Sansa."

"Sansa." She said, voice a whisper, eyes wide and round and fit to drown in. Her hand raised from one bicep and before he could speak or snarl... it was at his face, brushing aside the hair so carefully combed over it... and resting on the shattered flesh it hid. "That's twice now."

Sandor's mouth hung open and for the first time, she saw fear blooming behind his eyes. She had not seen him on the Blackwater, the Lannister enforcer turned craven as a fresh squire by the sorcerous green flames that seemed to lick and snare as if it had some murderous will. She had seen only his rage, his drunkenness, the sorrow he'd leaked out onto her with a knife against her throat and her hand... just where it was now.

Soft as sunlight (if not yet as warm). Shaking only because of cold, not because of her own fear. But most of all, not turning away. Studying him with eye and fingertip as much as he drank in the sight of her, about the only thing he seemed capable of. She gasped softly as his face turned into her touch, mouth closing slowly, and even the storm seemed to hush in awe...

Right before his eyes hardened again.

"You have some eye for the grotesque, little bird?"

She met his disdain with a sad smile, one choked with memories he didn't need to guess at. "I've seen the grotesque, Sandor. I was betrothed to it. It stalked and tore at me for months, just because it could and no-one would stop it." Her hands turned and Sandor had to bite down on the inside of his good cheek to not groan as he knuckles stroked his face. Years. Decades. Beyond memory.

White flame arced across the sky again, but he felt only the lightning of her simple, searching touch. One so far beyond what a butchering dog like him deserved that he scarce believed it was real; maybe they were both dying out in the storm somewhere and he was dreaming this. 

"Truly, you think I fear this? Hate it?" She shook her head and Sandor felt his throat tighten, heart sliding back down his throat to pound against his ribs like some Summer Island savage loose in his chest. "I could count on one hand the people who were kind to me in that hell, Sandor, and still have fingers to spare. You were one of them."

"You..." His tongue wouldn't work. His voice didn't want to obey him, but his damned stubborn stupid fucking pride didn't get the message. "You're... You're tired, Sansa." 

"Thrice!" A smile turned impish and Sandor knew he had to be drowning in a bog somewhere. "An honor."

Honor. That word broke the spell. Every thundering fool who'd ever crowed to him of "honor" and "duty" and fucking "chivalry" was in his ears, and reminding him a thousand times over that he was no knight, nor did he ever want to be. He wrenched himself back from her as if her hand were a fresh flame, forcing a dark enjoyment at the dismay written on her face.

"I'm no man of fucking honor. Set by the fire, it won't last long."

He turned from her so he'd not see the pain he knew he'd birth on her features. The confusion. Instead he sat low and close to the flames, almost over them, hating them so near but knowing he needed their warmth. There was a shuffling to his side and he knew she was there, but did not look. She did not speak, he did not ask. They both stared into the fire and Sandor damned himself for still feeling her hand on him, reaching down through his gargoyle's mask and deep into him. 

Deep enough to wound, and shake all he thought he knew. 

 


	3. Chapter 3

"My lady?"

_Little bird?_

She had to blink a few times before the rude real took place of her memories. The growling rasp became the higher tones of a younger man, and she turned to see him, concern in his eyes. He stood before the fire the rest of his companions shared, roasting a fat boar and passing around a single wineskin to ward off the chill. 

Sandor had drummed it into them quick that the coming of night was no excuse to get drunk. _If you think no bastard's fucking clever enough to wait for you to get good and pissed, then stick a sword in you when you're too drunk to lift yer own, you deserve to get fucking stuck._

Such language. So coarse, shorn of all pretense and varnish. Only ever the truth. No matter how cruel.

"Merrick," she said quickly, as if forcing herself to focus, "All is well?"

"Just wondered if you were feeling alright, Your Grace." He nodded at her wooden plate, still well plied with meat and bread but untouched, cooling on the rock she sat on. "You've not even had a bite."

"Oh, yes, my stomach is... a little queasy today," she said, bright smile of gratitude covering what her lie could not, "Too much riding, I suppose."

The man was hardly a fool, in fact Sandor even bit out a few almost-complimentary words about him once, but he was a smallfolk. They weren't animals, nor dotards, and Sansa had learned that well... but they were too willing to believe their highborn lords and ladies softer and weaker. Merrick nodded and gestured to her plate with a small smile. 

"I can put it by the fire, m'lady. Keep it warm for you, if it clears up."

"I would be grateful, thank you."

Another small flush of pride, that his lady had graced him not only with his name but a thank you, as well. Sansa's polite smile warmed and grew into one genuine, but not for the reason Merrick thought. She wondered how her champion would have reacted if he'd seen the man's blush and smile, or the way he fretted over her. Probably a snarl and a grimace, or a too-loud sharpening of his greatsword. 

_Always so eager to act the fearsome guard dog, even if he is so much more._

"I'll leave you be, m'lady, but ye best not to tarry long from the fire." He nodded to the thick clouds on the dark horizon, tall and solid as a distant, moving mountain range. "They promise rain, and snow, I think."

"I shall, Merrick. I have much to think on, and, well..."

As if on cue to some celestial farce, there was a burst of laughter, then another, until three men were clutching their sides and wiping tears from their faces. Sansa smiled and Merrick sighed. "Understood, m'lady. I'll leave ye be, and rein in that lot." He turned on his heel, plate in hand, muttering under his breath but not low enough for her to miss his words-

"Hound'll have my bloody head if he finds out they were tottering on wine round her..."

Sansa mused that any other woman of her stature would have been more indignant that she, Queen in the North, had been whittled down to merely "her". But the sharp look in her eyes and the drooping of her mouth came more from the first word he had spoken. An anger fortified by sadness that even after all these years of loyal service, even the men he had trained still thought of him as... as...

_Just a beast, and why? Because of his face? Because he doesn't talk pretty like Lord Jaime or the Knight of Flowers? Even the Kingslayer was forgiven, once the truth outed of what he had saved that night, rather than whom he had killed... and Loras is hardly one to mock looks, now. Why not then for my-_

Sansa screwed her eyes shut all of a sudden, beating that thought back before it could form. But it did. It always did. No good could come of it, but it was a tumor no maester could carve out of her, no amount of prayers exorcise. What was she _doing_ here? On the road to White Harbor, without word of her leave, dashing so she could drag back to Winterfell a man who had never been dragged anywhere, lest it was to a tavern with bottomless credit. And that was only the tip of it. Like a rock thrown at a window, her flight could send shards of gossip and inquiry falling about her. What of Willas? What would she tell him? 

_Mayhap this is for the best._

Her hand clenched and blue eyes that could be limpid pools or icy orbs stared at the advancing clouds. She could not accept that. She had survived so much, sacrificed so much and had so much taken from her... were the gods so cruel that they would take _him_ from her, too, after all they had endured?

She snorted softly, sad, knowing smile on her face. The kind of smile that's nearer to a grimace, and only comes from a lifetime more akin to dragging oneself through a dark tunnel. He knew what he would say to _that_ question, but he might mutter that she was asking the wrong question.

_No-one is taking him. He goes of his own accord. He always has..._

But that, too, still smacked of falsehood. 

 

++++++++++

 

She awoke to warmth, after thinking she would never feel it again. The Hound had to stamp out the fire once the smoke started to fill the top of the hut, driving rain making the thin chimney almost useless, but they had got some way to dry before he did. He'd barely spoken after that last, abrupt snarl the night before. Just spent the night glaring at the flames and letting them do their work, the odd twitch of his mouth the only hint he still lived.

Sansa wanted to speak, but found not the courage. The Hound was not of Littlefinger's ilk, nor the knights and lordlings she knew in the Vale. If nothing else, that seven-hells-cursed cockscum Baelish had schooled her on how to listen, and watch, and shape the minds of those men with her words... but the Hound stood apart. 

And she feared driving him further from her.

_Stupid girl, touching his face. As if he would want some winsome thing like you pawing him._

Then she realized he was not inside. Tentative morning light drifted in through the single window. There was little there save for the gently smoking fire and the bed and a rough basket with a plethora of supplies any woodsman would need. His armor - black mail and half-plate, still glistening from the rain - sat square in one corner, neatly arranged with the care of a man who lived by its protection. But then her ears pricked and she heard a soft... scraping? No. Brushing.

She got up and had her hand at the door before realizing it was only her dress she wore. Dry now, thank the gods, and thus not showing the world every inch of her flesh, clinging so tight that no man would have needed an imagination to see her curves. Her pales cheeks reddened as she realized _he_ had seen her like that in their awkward moment last night, and had she seen his eyes rove down past her face? 

Sansa shook her head, scowling. Not the time for that. She wrapped a cloak around her and found something for her feet - and thank the gods _they_ had dried, too - then opened the door. 

He turned when she opened the door, brush suspended in the air above Stranger's flanks. The inky stallion harumphed and shook his mane as if to bid her a fine good morning, and she couldn't help the giggle that escaped her lips. 

Sandor frowned minutely, then his eyes slid to his steed... and she saw them soften. 

_There is some kindness in him. Maybe he doesn't understand it, or fears it, but it's there._

"That's right, give the little bird some, but not me," he said with a snort, but she could feel no rancor behind it. "Faithless bloody animal..."

Sansa opened her mouth to make some comment about a knight's faithful steed, but the memory of last night pinned it to her tongue. Instead she cleared her throat and took in their surroundings, without sheets of rain and darkness masking them. The woods seemed to gleam in the light, every leaf and branch soaked and drooping. The ground underneath her squelched and in the distance she could hear...

Pigeons roosting. Finches calling. Sparrows chirping. The high, sharp cry of a circling hawk. Chattering squirrels and twigs breaking as other, nameless things hunted and fled, an endless dance.

Sansa closed her eyes and smiled. Free. She had not felt this free since Winterfell, four years and an age ago.

"What will you do after this?"

"After what?"

"After we reach The Wall." Sansa frowned and turned back to him, still methodically grooming Stranger. "You must have thought of it."

"Not really. World's my sodding oyster and I want no part of it." He snorted. "Gregor's dead. That's all the unfinished business I had left."

The bitterness and ache in his words gave her some queer courage again. The idea that someone who had helped her so often would feel so... empty, once his life's goal had been removed. Especially when that goal was killing his own brother.

"Apart from me."

The brush paused. He cast a quick glance over his shoulder and resumed. "Yes."

If she'd been the dreamy girl that had come to King's Landing all those years ago, that one word would have been enough for her to press harder. But she was no longer that girl, and she had seen what pressing the Hound resulted in. Instead she just smiled at his back, taking that sweet, small measure of satisfaction.

 _He cares. He all but said it._  

"Have you... considered another master?"

"Kill for the Starks instead of kill for the Lannisters, you mean?" Another snort. Gods, did the man find grim humor in every facet of life? "Or kill for the Watch, more likely, eh? Not too many Starks left..."

Her throat tightened and her fingers clenched until her knuckles cracked. He heard them, turned... and saw that terrible look she bore. Grief and anger and... some strange, hurtful betrayal casting years onto that lovely face. He sighed and shook his head. His voice was low. 

"Ignore me, gi-"

One corner of his mouth turned up, and she could see from that angle the man he could have been without his brother. The strong jaw and fine cheekbones, even his broken nose added a dash of something exciting. On that side his hair was thick and full, not stringy and lank from being combed down his scars over and over. Sansa felt the anger drain out of her. 

_He would have been so handsome._

_He still is._

"-little bird."

"Killing." She said, as if that one word were a condemnation. "Is that all you can think of beyond this?"

"I told you before, little bird, killing is-"

"The sweetest thing there is." She padded closer to him and then she was at his side, looking up into his eyes. Now she could see the scars, and they were not all on his face. She'd no longer had the blind eyes she come to King's Landing with. "I don't believe you."

"Don't call me a liar, girl."

"Then why come for me?" She said quickly, eyes wider now, reminding him for a moment of the hunting dogs from home when they had a scent. "Hmm? You'd left King's Landing, I'd heard that much. You could have vanished, gone anywhere, across the sea, north of the Wall, anywhere. But you came for me. You slinked into the Vale and saved me."

Some fool part of her wanted to add "like a knight from the stories", but again, she stayed her tongue... even though she wanted so to say it. Not just _say_ it, but have him _believe_ it. She had seen Sandor Clegane kill. It was brutal, merciless, frightening and she wasn't blind to that feral gleam that came to his eyes when he waded through blood. Nor the fact that he was so utterly composed afterward, as if snuffing a life was as important to him as swatting a bloodfly. 

"You are no ser," she said, so low and quietly, and her earnest shone through all the brighter for it, "And you have done harm to many... but titles don't make a hero, and what you've done can't erase the good-"

His hand snapped out like a striking snake, impossibly fast for a man so vast. His eyes were flaming, blazing at her as his hands shook. His lips curled back from his lips and for a tiny instant she was that girl again when they first met, shirking away from the hideous Hound. 

"Stop!" He said, voice a wet, angry bark that shuddered even in that one word. "Just... kah-"

He grunted wordlessly and threw his hand out and let her go with it, facing Stranger's flank and bracing his hands on the big animal. The horse whinnied curiously as Sandor rested his forehead onto that thick, smooth fur, eyes closed and breath erratic. Unseen, Sansa's hand rose. She wanted to touch him. Rest her hand on his shoulder. Embrace him, if he would let her, and to hells with whatever maids would gossip and gasp at such thoughts. Countless people looked on the Hound and saw a monster, a beast, an upright dog without scruples or honor or conscience; she looked on him and saw Sandor Clegane.

"No more." He said again, voice sounding more exhausted than angry. "No more questions, no more asking. We'll stay here tonight, I'll catch some game. Hut wouldn't be here if there wasn't some around." He let his hands drop and cast his eyes about. "See if you can find anything not soaked fucking through we can use for the fire."

She should let it go. He was angry, and tired, and pushing him was-

The only way things would change.

"Just tell me why." Her eyes snapped to her, red flames now burning cold and blue in stormy grey. "And I won't ask again."

Her finger entwined with his. They were rough and hairy and bore calluses like crab shells. But they were warm and alive and she clutched his hand without looking away from his face. The fire was cooled in him. His jaw relaxed and he shook his head, finally looking away before he spoke again.

"... I couldn't leave you there." 

He pulled his hand away and before she could get over her surprise, he'd snatched his bow and quiver from Stranger and was stalking into the woods.

 

++++++++++

 

He slammed the door behind him and winced at the bruises on his knuckles. Myrrish fucker had a head like an anvil. 

Sandor cursed softly, venomously, innovatively, as he washed his hands in the basin, swaying lightly on his feet. The Winter War may have ended but while the Others had been vanquished, that didn't mean all in the realm became paradigms of virtue, and dockside taverns were still fine places to find all manner of surly scum. 

Hells, look at  _him_.

 _A fine way to spend your last night in Westeros_ , he thought in some hidden corner of his mind that was still sober. _Drunk and brawling with dock rats. Oh, she'd be so proud._

Most times he could have reined that in, bit back his anger, but with the wine rushing through him and opening up every floodgate he had-

-his fist lashed out and smashed into the mirror, splintering the wood behind it and instantly the whole thing was one massive spiderweb. But he looked... and he could see his face a thousand times over, a hundred angles like he was a foot away from the eyes of some vast insect. Scores of Sandor Cleganes glared back at him and he punched again, again-

Until it rained broken glass and his hands were bloody and he collapsed backward onto the bed with his hands covering his face.

This was supposed to be the end of it. But he couldn't make it go away.


	4. Chapter 4

Sandor was fast learning that "bright" did not mean "warm" in the North. A man looking out his window would see blinding spears through the trees but there was no warmth in the rays. The air was brittle as hanging ice and the leaves and trees did not dry; they froze, or stayed wet, waiting to simply absorb the moisture into themselves. When he returned from his hunt, he found the gi-Sansa, cursing furiously as she tried to work flint and tinder.

"Damn... Damned... Bloody... Stupid... Urgh!"

"Little bird found a new voice?"

She turned as he dumped the slack-jawed carcass onto the ground outside the hut, squatting next to it. Sansa's eyes grew wide as she saw the fur and mouth, the yellow eyes gone glassy in death.

"Is that a-"

"Not a wolf, little bird," Sandor said, dagger pulled with a leathery sigh, turning the body over, "Just a dog. Would have thought you'd've learned the difference by now."

There's a low, wet sound like wet cloth being pulled apart and Sansa does not turn away as he begins to skin the dog. He flicks a glance at her as he works, hands stinking and bloody and in their rightful element. After a moment she goes back to the fire... or her cursing, more accurately. 

It takes an hour of fumbling and muttering before smoke is rising from the little hearth, and to see Sansa's face you'd think she'd carried it from the Red Wastes themselves. Sandor snaps a troublesome leg bone and looks up at that smile. 

Bright, like the Northern skies. But never cold. 

He eyes turn to him, brimming with pride and his lips twist into a lopsided smile, favoring his unmarred side. 

"First fire?"

"I think I did well."

Sandor grunted and nodded. "Flint does help. We'll see how well you do when it's just a spindle-and-notch in your hands."

"Spindle-and-nock?"

"Notch. That's what you rub the spindle into, until you get smoke."

He expected her confusion, but not the quiet steel that followed it. "Would you teach me?"

"Going to have to, aren't I? Can't have one of us bloody useless out here..."

She piled on pieces of stiff bark and moss and pine leaves until smoke became embers became licking, questing flames. Enough to cook the meat Sandor had prepared: ribs and limbs and chunks of fatty, stringy muscle with sticks shoved through them. But before he could place them atop the flames-

Her hand reached out again. Wrapped around his wrist, delicate as a doll's.

"I'll cook."

"You didn't even know how to make a fire a few hours ago."

"And yet you warm yourself by one, now." She said, not of triumph unmistakable, and Sandor noticed how her nose crinkled when that breed of smile graced her lips. "I think I can manage."

Sandor regarded her closely, balancing his options it seemed. 

"We don't have much, little bird. Why'd I risk you ruining our meat?"

"Aside from the fact you'll be watching me like a bloody hawk the whole time, as always?"

He couldn't argue with that. And she still had her hand on him. His eyes slid down her, from face to neck to arm and then to hand. He moved his hand in a half-circle over her own, until he'd twisted it and now she was in his grasp, great rough fingers holding her wrist (though they seemed to engulf much of her forearm). 

Sandor felt her stiffen. His eyes flashed to hers and there was that look again. Barely a day old and still, whenever they were close...

He smiled. Not a sneer, or a smirk, the things he wore as armor against the world. Against himself. His lips curled upward and Sansa fancied that when the smile made the corners of his eyes crinkle and those grey storms abated for a moment, she barely noticed his scars. 

Something fresh, dripping and smelly was put into her hand. Mayhap it somewhat spoiled the moment.

"As m'lady commands."

 

++++++++++

 

The fire was enough to roast the meat, but not much else. Even when the bark had been stripped from the trees and dried in the hut, pine needles collected and moss from under the precious few fallen trees close by, there was so little.

Sansa lay on the bed, shivering and blaming herself. Stupid, _stupid_ girl. One duty she had, as simple as making a fire, and she couldn't make it last until the morning. Now the wind was gnawing at the door, whipping under the rude barrier and down the chimney, and she could feel it nibbling at her toes, her scalp...

And she could here what sounded like a dozen tiny blacksmiths working hard at the floor. Clinking, tinkling, clanking, grinding, as her protector lay on the floor in full armor, as if layers of cold steel would protect him from the cold. She raised her head from under the covers and saw him shaking, never looking so fragile to her.

"Sandor?"

"Wh... What?"

"You need to come into the bed."

His gaze turned to her to fast she was sure his neck would snap. The question in his eyes drew a little cough from her own throat and she glanced around the room as if embarrassed. 

"You are cold. Lying down there covered in metal will not keep you warm. You need covers, blankets, the bed-"

" _You're_ in the bed, too."

Some flush raced through Sansa at the idea of him so close to her, surrounding her, but she frowned and with that seemed to quiet it. "Very perceptive, and I will warm you, too."

Sansa had rarely if ever seen shock slap Sandor Clegane across the face, but she saw it now. Just a flash, an instant, his face half in shadow, eyes wide and mind clearly struggling for some, _any_ response. Then he grumbled in his throat and curled tighter into himself.

"I'm fine down here."

"No, you're not." He heard shuffling, more than she should be doing, and when he looked back, the girl was seated at the edge of the bed, bare of covers and only in her dress and undershirt. "And I need you to _live_ , Sandor, not suffer and freeze like a monk."

_Heh. If only she knew._

With a reluctance that almost made her want to roll her eyes and _heave_ him onto the mattress, Sansa watched the big man shed his armor with shaking hands. The last part of it clanked onto the floor and he was too tired, too unsteady to gather it up properly.

He looked to her, hair hanging in curtains before his eyes, body hard and broad under his tunic and breeches... and she nodded, like a speta approving of needlepoint.

"Hurry, now..."

He did as she bid, and she did not meet his eyes. She did not want him to see what lurked there.

 

++++++++++

 

_What in the bloody hells are you doing?_

Sandor ignored that still small (and fucking annoying) voice as he approached her on the bed. As he got closer she shuffled so she was against the wall, leaving as much space for him as she could. He lay down next to her and immediately she began piling on blankets, a flitting little bird making sure her nest was secure.

"Damnit, girl, I can grab my own sodding covers-"

"There." She said, apparently ignoring both him and the glare he shot her way. Sandor decided he would need something better than his usual glower with her: now they were as effective as pebbles against plate armor. "No trouble."

Oh, he could have laughed at that. Under a mountain of covers, pressed together in the darkness, and she was suffocating him just by laying there. Every breath he took was stiff with her. Her hair and her sweat and that musk of hers... like pine and fur. A child of the North. 

She shuffled backward and without a warning he could feel the length of her pressed against him. His nose was almost buried in her curls, red and raw as naked flames and some foolish part of Sandor's mind forget his second-oldest fear and thought _I would burn in this forever, and gladly_.

Then he quickly reminded himself to pull his arse back a little ways, groin away from her own. He didn't want her feeling _that_ , and he would arrive, without bloody fail...

Damnit... she had to know what she was doing. Now woman, girl or otherwise, could be so innocent or blind. Grief and loss had gouged their scars into Sansa Stark but her beauty was still unmatched. At least in his eyes. All he had wanted and never deserved, never would, was encompassed within her. And now she was so close. More than close. Courage he didn't know he had welled in him and he felt his hand rise... stop in the air as if on a wire... jaw clenching and twitching as he... could he? Would she?

_You will never have this chance again. Stay your hand and a dream it will ever be._

He wrapped his arm around her, hand resting on her flat stomach, biting down as he felt the muscles under the fabric tighten under his touch. She made not a sound. Just an instant of stiff confusion, and then-

 

++++++++++

 

_He's touching me! No, he's... he's holding me!_

Sansa bit her bottom lip and just enjoyed the feeling. Something had been crackling between them and she could not name it, or place it. All Littlefinger's teachings, her observations in King's Landing and the Eyrie... they were skewed when it came to a man like Sandor Clegane. He'd rebuffed her and snapped at her and yet he was in her bed and his hand was a warm, soft weight against her stomach.

She closed her eyes and did not bother with thinking any longer. Feeling was so much better. Come the time she would have let her carnal thoughts conjure the Knight of Flowers, or Jaime Lannister, or even - far, far ago, when she was a different girl in a different world - another golden-haired Lannister. No longer. 

Manhood for her, all that a woman found desirable, was pressed against her back like some vast barrier against the whistling winds outside, her bulwark against the horrors and dangers of the world. 

"I have never felt more safe." She said the words in a whisper, turning her head so he might at least glimpse her eyes when she spoke. "Not since Winterfell."

He was silent. She did not press him. Instead she rested her hand over his own, then grasped it lightly... pulling it upwards...

Grey eyes that should have blended in with the shadows were stark and sharp to her now. 

She lifted his hand from her stomach... and there was no resistance, until she felt him stiffen when he realized where it was going-

-or thought he did-

-until she placed it over her heart. He could feel the pulse steady and soothing, and he fancied he could feel it tremble through the valley between her breasts... and his fingers splayed to-

"I-No. No."

He pulled his hand away, tore his eyes away, ripped _everything_ away from her and she could have cried at his absence. So close. Always he protected her, never leaving her eyes, but there was a gulf like the Narrow Sea between them still. _Well_ , Sansa thought, _I am not the girl who flees from him anymore, nor any bloody man._

She turned onto her other side, facing him now, both of them swaddled and covered, face parted by inches in the shadows of the hut. 

"I would... I did not mean to-"

"Save your words, little bird," he said, that sour, gruff tone she knew well. His shield of words and scorn. "I'll not hear them. Just warm yourself and let an old dog sleep."

She stared in silence and he could see the shade of his own face in her eyes. Pools. Like the ponds he and his sister had played in before...

Sandor screwed his eyes shut and bowed his head. He hated that she did this to him. All the armor and defences he'd spent a lifetime erecting were battered down by this girl and her damned fucking kindness, that wordless courage to pet the dog even when all it did was snarl and snap. She opened doors he'd long shut and barred, memories he didn't want to have anymore. 

Then she gave him another one. 

Light and quick as a breeze. Soft against his lips and he almost felt them sting from the flavor. Roasted dog and a girl's desire and things he would never look in the eye. 

It was gone before he could get angry, or at least rise to full froth. His eyes snapped open and she had already moved her face away from his. He _wanted_ her fear, in that moment. He wanted her to understand what he was, what she would lose compared to the scrap of a man she would gain. But there was none. Just a cool, patient contentment, as if she'd sprung a trap she'd lain seasons before. 

_Mayhap that's the truth of it._

"Don't fucking do that again."

He spoke it and they both heard it; her smile told him how seriously she took his words. 

Instead she huddled closer to his chest, until her meadow of curling, raw silk curls were flaming under his chin and her voice murmured against his chest.

"Good night, Sandor."

_Fucking girl. Fucking cold. Fucking hells._

He drew his arms around her, one under her and one above, until they could leech off each other for warmth and the cold lost all sway over their bodies. He shuffled into some comforting position and realized before he spoke that his hands were stroking her hair, gentle and slow as if he'd never seen it before and feared he'd never see it again after that night.

"Goodnight, Sansa."

 

++++++++++

 

Merrick got them moving again before the sun had fully risen, knowing his Queen wanted to waste no time in getting to White Harbor. He tried whispers and then measured words until finally he dared to reach down and shake her gently by the shoulder in her tent. 

She muttered something in her sleep. Some dream, a word, and he thought she sounded so much younger. 

"My Lady...? My Lady...?"

Sansa's eyes opened and focused. Almost disappointed. Merrick withdrew his hand smartly and nodded to the tent opening. Beyond it there was the creaking of beams and slapping of tents being closed, horses stomping and men shouting orders. 

"The men are ready, m'lady. Just your tent."

"How long did I sleep?"

"Just a few hours, m'lady."

Sansa got to her feet and had stretched out her morning cramps with only one, long flex of her back, the movement rolling into her shoulders, neck and arms. Merrick was not blind to beauty, but he smiled at her strength more. Few highborns he'd met could be ready for a hard ride fresh from slumber. She rose to her feet and threw on the wolf-pelt that her husband bought her years before. 

"Good man. How much further, would you say? Half a day?"

"At yesterday's pace? Most likely, m'lady. Maybe a little longer."

The Queen nodded as he spoke, but her eyes were fixed unwavering on the southern horizon. She knew just beyond those hills, around the bend of the silver slash of the river, lay White Harbor, pale and gleaming by the Narrow Sea. Her heart beat faster, harder, the peace of her dreams shattered as trembling uncertainty took its place. 

_You may be too late. Finding word of him will not be hard, not with the way he looks, let alone acts. But you may find nothing but stories and memories, perhaps the name of the ship that took him-_

Then she growled. Merrick and the men to her flanks looked at her quickly, then looked away from the hard stare in her eyes. Wolf-blood was hardly unexpected in the Starks, but Sansa had never been one to-

"Leave the tent."

"M-My Lady? Are you-"

"Yes." She climbed onto her horse without aid, leaving a man-at-arms half-crouched and useless at her mount's side. "We're going now."

"But what if we don't reach White Harbor in-"

"Then we'd better," she said, and a feral grin that left no doubt as to Sansa's lineage was cast all about. 

Then she spurred her horse with a yell and her ankles and it bolted ahead of the group. Hammering hooves were behind her within moments, but her eyes were only for the horizon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My first romantic effort in a while, so feel free to critique, and thanks for reading!


	5. Chapter 5

Captain Vilitis reminded Sandor of little more than a fat seagull, cawing for bread. 

His eyes were small and shrewd. His head cocked to the side quickly when he heard something new, almost like a tic. Ever was he smoothing down his silk shirt and running a finger down each strand of his stiff beard, fashioned into a trident aimed at his belly. Whenever his cup drained that shrill, insistent voice would crow and crow until it was replenished, and even the kisses he gave to the whore fastened at his side were more like pecks at breadcrumbs. 

"You are running from something, my friend?"

_One more of these foreign cunts calls me 'friend' like they know me, I'll shove their eyes up their arseholes._

Of course, what he actually said was, "No. Peace is no thing for a sellsword, and this bloody county's lousy with it. Better odds for me in the Free Cities."

"Like Braavos?"

"That's where you're going, isn't it?"

"Oh, yes, yes." More fingering. More cocking. More dragging out his screed of power for the moment, oblivious to Sandor's clenched jaw and the hand tight on his sword under the table. "Tomorrow morning we leave. My men and eye, heh, too long at sea, you see, and-"

"Yes, yes, fucking and drinking and wasting coin," Sandor said with a wave of his hand, "I've heard it. Just tell me what it will cost, for me and my horse."

Vilitus named a sum. Sandor named a lower one. Regardless of the final amount, he knew he was being driven hard, but agreeing too quickly would make it look like he _was_ running. He knew the Pentoshi bastard would immediately make delays, start asking questions, looking for a reward... and all he'd get would be wasted time and Sandor most likely killing him. 

He wasn't adverse to the idea, but he did not want to linger.

 _Two days, it's been. Another, two at the most, and she'll be here._  

"Done." He said to the final price, and he counted out the coins into that fat but weathered claw, rising to leave right away. "Name of yer ship?"

" _Galley_ , my friend, _galley_ ," Vilitus said with a proud chuckle, speaking around the lips of his whore, "The _Golden Fish_ , and well-named she is for the coin she's made me. Furthest pier to the Sea. These narrow docks up here can barely take her..." He licked his lips and his hand vanished under willing skirts. "... _girth_."

A shrill, counterfeit giggle answered him and Sandor turned away. The captain called after him, bidding him stay to partake of his pleasure, but the man known once as The Hound kept walking until he was in the street.

 _Cities of these rats, that's what you'll endure. Every one of them staring at you, whispering about you, treating you like some lumbering freak or cursed creature._ His thoughts mocked him as he strode the cobbled streets, chasing him down to his tavern. _But what else is there? South, where they would know you and she would find you? And to stay?_

The big man shook his head as he brushed past the tavern-keeper and his greetings, wanting only the isolation of his room. To stay. To simply not move. Gods, how simple that sounded. How easy. 

He'd thought that, years before. He was wrong. This was...

Sandor rested his head on the door as he closed it, and when he spoke his words were only half to himself.

"This is best. For all of us."

 

++++++++++

 

Wood and forest started to change into something else as they made their way north. Dirt and mud became peat and sucking sand that they had to move gingerly around. Stranger didn't like it. The strange woods spoke to him in ways they couldn't follow, and all he could do was whinny and snort his displeasure. 

Sansa felt inklings of it, though. Now the trees became thick with vines, pressing into the gaps between branches in a slow, silent drive towards the light. The sun became more alien to them until one day they could no longer find it. The ground became a marsh, pitted and scarred by streams that carried an endless procession of rotting logs. Things of fur and wing gave way to flashes of scales, coiling or skittering around them.

She held tighter to her protector as he steered Stranger further into the swamp, that tangled place of half-night and rampant forestry.

"I wish we could take the road."

"So do I," Sandor said, and with feeling. He remembered the last time he'd passed this way. Years before when King Robert had trekked north to see his old friend Eddard, bringing his wife and children in tow... and so, The Hound. A single causeway had been the only way through the fetid swamp, and Sandor had seen things staring at him with lizard scales and lion eyes that were more than wolves and bears. "But Moat Cailin is too risky. We don't know who mans it, and even if we did-"

"They'd likely be no friend to the Starks."

Sandor grunted. The girl was getting a healthy sensitivity to danger. In other days, one would call it overly anxious. But those were not other days. 

Soon the ground was too thick and wet for them to ride, and he had to lead Stranger on foot, Sansa bringing up the rear. Every few minutes his eyes would glance over his shoulder, ensuring that tangle of red hair was still there. 

The air grew close with the foliage, and that creeping cloak of dread descended on them, slaying their tongues as they walked. But Sansa still thought. Pondered. Remembered. And questioned.

_He has not spoke of that night. Nor even moved toward me. Mayhap he was not japing when he snarled so. But then-_

"My lady?!"

She blinked away here reverie and something slithering and shining glared at her with cold reptile eyes from a tree limb, mass of coils suddenly extending towards her. A mouth that was far too large for such a body became her whole vision, dripping fangs eager for her-

Silver flashed like a comet landing. A thin whine of metal chopping through the air, ending with a pitiful little _shunk_ as it severed the snake clean in two.

The head flew behind her and landed with a splash. The rest of it was spasming and flopping around like a dismembered tentacle, still trying to grab onto the tree it came from. Sandor cursed and bent down to pick it up, studying the strange colors and the long length. Finally he shrugged and stuffed the still carcass into his saddlebag.

"Wh... What are you doing?"

"There's meat on that. We'll be needing it."

"You... You call me 'my lady?'"

"It's what you are, isn't it?" He'd already turned from her, growling little words to placate the spooked Stranger. Sansa had always heard that low, gentle cooing was the best way to put a frightened horse at ease; clearly Stranger needed sterner stuff. "Can't very well go around calling you 'girl' or speaking your name all the time."

She couldn't fault the reasoning, but Sansa's eyes narrowed slightly, like a hunter scenting prey. She glided to Sandor's side.

"Shouldn't it be 'm'lady', then?"

"Gods, what're you singing about now, little bird?"

"M'lady." She said, pressing the point, driven by the dreadful silence since that stolen night. "That's what the maids and septas always said. My lady is..." Her lips twisted for a moment as if hiding a smile, and though she bowed her head Sandor could see her reddening cheeks. "... something else."

He stared at her with that hard grey eyes and she stared right back with her clear blue ones. Gods, he could smell the expectation on her. The yearning for words he could not, would not give her. Then the moment passed as something cackled from the bog and he shook his head.

"No time to stand around talking, m'lady," he said, and Sansa felt a slight sting, "No place, either."

They walked on through the marsh and Sando thought that might have been the end of it. But barely an hour passed before her light tones were buzzing in his ear again.

"That could be something for you, after this."

"What could?"

"You could be my sworn shield."

Sandor barked a laugh loud enough to send something above them flying away in surprise. "Tried that once before, little bird, remember? Didn't end too well."

"Not for Joffrey. It did for you."

Bitter memory clouded Sandor's eyes as he reviewed past history against those hopeful words. He saw a cave with a flaming sword, a man who would not die and so wanted to. A girl more wolf than wolves and the shattered, raped town they'd passed through. A brawl with upright snakes that ended with him pleading for mercy under a tree, and being coolly denied it. 

Darkness. Madness. Shivering and visions as life and sanity slipped from him. 

Her face near the end of it. Smiling through the fog and the clouds and the falling leaves. Bidding him farewell.

But it was not to be. 

"... Sansa?"

She nearly started at his tone. So... soft. Rare had she ever heard him so quiet, and a strange fear gripped her as she heard something akin to guilt or pain, then saw it in his eyes when he turned to her. The stream next to them bubbled and trickled and was all that broke their silence. He sighed and patted Stranger's nose as if for support, then took in a breath that swelled him to his full height.

"I need to tell you something. About your sis-"

Then a log in the water reared up and they were both so stunned they almost did not notice-

-until nearly a full half of it split open and rows of teeth like bloody daggers roared and lurched towards them.

"Down!"

One hand pushed her aside and away as if she were a child, knocking her back into the muck a good few yards back. She watched with disbelieving eyes as Stranger reared up in terror, Sandor's face set in a vicious snarl as his sword found the air again-

-and the lizard-lion lunged for him, jaw's snapping closed-

-on his free arm, flung up in desperation.

He screamed. She joined him. She shouted "no!" with all the fury and despair she had when she'd seen her father taken, lungs and heart frozen to ice as Sandor was borne down to the ground. The lizard-lion shook and stomped the moss and filth off it, revealing scales covering it like armor and spikes from crown to the heavy tail that dragged behind it. Sandor shouted again, but now there was rage choking it, righteous anger that drove back his pain as he started to rain down blows with his free arm.

"FUCKING! UGLY! BASTARD!"

Again and again his sword whacked and smacked onto that scaly hide, but the angle was wrong, him down on his back, unable to bring his full weight to bear, and Sansa's horror became as awful as nightmare. There seemed no way to pierce that beast, armored as it was by the gods. There was a sickening, screeching crunch as his cowter began to crack and bend under those terrible jaws, threatening to take his arm away. 

And in the chaos, his eyes found hers. Wide and furious, but calm in their core like the storms they always reminded her of. 

She had to live. In her life was hope. All hope. But once this monster was through with him, it would be her. 

_You don't die here, dog. Not yet. Or would you have her die with you?_

Sandor roared again and strained, heaved, grunted and trembled... until the front half of the monster was almost in the air, weight of it pulling at his am like an anvil welded to his gauntlet and vambrace, until he had an opening-

-to drop his sword, hand darting for his dagger-

-pulling it free and jamming it under that gaping jaw.

At once the beast screamed, and that was the sound for it. Not the inhuman, unearthly roar of a predator they'd heard before; now it was thick with pain, outraged and stunned, letting go of Sandor and backing away, shaking its dead with the dagger still impaling it under the mouth. His arm was dead. He could feel the blood ooze from it but he couldn't move it, and he groped for his sword.

The lizard-lion fixed eyes on him again. Nothing in them but hunger and primal, animal rage. It charged and he screamed at her to _run_ -

A chorus of whistles from across the narrow stream. Flashes of wood and metal, faster than Sansa could follow-

-and in a blink the monster had four spears buried in its side, from back leg to under the eye. It roared again, rearing up on stubby back legs, insane with pain-

-Sandor grasped his sword and swung with what strength he had left, bellowing his defiance one last time-

-slashing deep into that softer belly-

-and a moment later, a quartet of arrows joined the gash he'd made, stinking of poison and milked venom even as they sunk deep and true. 

Sandor wasn't thinking anymore; he was reacting. Instinct drove him as he crawled over to Sansa, as if a limping man with a ruined arm could shield her, defend her. She gasped onto his back as he knelt before her, eyes still fixed on the thrashing creature that hadn't realized it was already dead. 

Blood began to pour from it, and not just from the wounds. Pus and bile spewed from its mouth and as it turned its bowles seemed to vent in its wake. One last shuddering cry it gave, ending as if the sound were being chopped into fragments... then with a thud that shook the ground under them it collapsed, and moved no more. 

Panting. Grunting. Choking. She knew the danger was not passed but Sansa's thoughts were stamped with Sandor Clegane, and she moved to his arm, holding it gently-

"Fuck me, girl?!"

-only not gentle enough. She could see the plate armor from shoulder to hand was cracked and dented, but it had saved him. Without it she knew he would be bleeding out from a stump, instead, spewing his life into the swamp-

_No. Not today._

"Get up," she said fiercely, grabbing him under his armpits and heaving, futile as it was. He tried to rise and she set her feet square, even as they sank deeper into the mud. "We need to find Stranger and-"

"We have him."

She looked up. Sandor was not looking at her. He was looking at the voice.

For now it had form. And company. 

Like wraiths from legend, a dozen short, sinewy men, clad as much in reeds and vines as leather and wool, appeared from their hiding places. It seemed as if the marsh itself had given them life, so cleanly did they emerge from their ambush. There could have been an army of them squatting in the reeds. Arrows were notched, spears readied, and Sansa even spied one craggy-faced fellow slipping a fresh dart into a blowpipe almost as long as he. But the speaker set himself apart, not only by his bearing.

He walked apart from the stern, unsmiling group, head high and eyes quick and bright. A rough red beard sprouted from a thin face and on his breast was embroidered a simple sigil of green and black.

"My... Our thanks," Sansa said, knowing it best to start on that note and besides, what else could she say? The man cracked a smile that reminded her of her father. Indulgent and wise, the kind of smile a favored uncle would give you and never have you think it false. When he spoke again, it was with the air of one who commanded.

"It has been far too long, Sansa," said Lord Howland Reed.


	6. Chapter 6

_He was in a field of green fire, and he knew not how he'd arrived. All was darkness and then there was a flash, a roar like a thousand souls in anguish and his eyes were his own again. Sandor looked around and felt the heat from the flames, pressing against him like they were almost touching, casting his mind back to that room, that brazier, that huge shadow falling over him-_

_Then he heard a voice in the crackling. All around was death in flame and smoke but the voice was light, high, untroubled. He would know it anywhere._

_He put up his hand and saw her, the bloody cloak he'd left her with over her shoulder, hair buffeting though he could feel no wind, holding her hand out gently to... something._

_Not a wolf, but easily as large. Black and slavering, fur so short he could see the gamey sinew covering its legs-_

_-the ravaged side of its face, as if something far more brutal had simply ripped the skin away with tooth and claw._

_Sandor staggered towards the vision, a hundred yards and an ocean away, across the field of fire. He knew this was wong. She was wrong, what was she doing? That thing was a monster, a beast, good for nothing but savaging the enemies of its masters. He had to get her away from it before-_

_-her hand touched its head and in a flash of fur it bit at her, drawing blood and Sandor's heart stopped and gutted in his chest like a candle. A gasp like ice came from his throat and he started to lurch faster, even as tears of rage threatened to leak from his eyes, rage to cover his terror that the flames caressed his legs._

_She was crying. She felt so betrayed. He could not hear her words but somehow he knew them. All the ones she had spoken and not spoken, calling out to the monstrous dog that was bounding away from her, abandoning her-_

_-to much worse._

_The flames grew around her. Curtains of flickering death that birth grotesque things that shambled and leered. Something not quite lion nor man, but with a sneer made of daggers and stunted claws. Another with a man's rough form but a stag's head, ever-bleating, hooves catching sparks. A man with not a strip of flesh anywhere, gibbering and giggling and licking lips that weren't there. That lizard-lion from the swamp, only now it was huge and wing'd, silver mane flowing down its back._

_Sandor screamed at her to run. He bellowed and roared but she could not see him, simply backed away... but there was nowhere to retreat to. The monstrosities surrounded her and started to paw her, grab her, draw blood without thinking, arguing and snarling at each other._

_Sandor felt something snap within him. A dam let loose. He started to run across the flames, grief and rage and terror numbing him even as he felt flesh shear off his form again like meat from a cooked bone. There was nothing left but her. Not Gregor, not his sister, not his duty or honor or any of that pointless shite._

_The flames burst before him, and he was enveloped. He reached out and they coiled like tendrils, holding him fast even as they bit down to his marrow, but leaving enough space for him to see them descend on her, ripping his cloak and her dress to shreds._

_The terror and despair writ on her face, her lips making the same words, over and over again._

_Shrieking. Crying. Laughing. Pulling. Tearing._

_Sandor saw his hand scorch and bubble to burning fat around his bones and-_

 

++++++++++

 

-woke screaming. 

The burning field vanished and he lurched up, toward a light above the awful ravishing below. He blinked and in that tiny gesture an age seemed to pass, days and nights rushing by like fireflies-

Until he was sitting up in a bed far too small for him, feet hanging off the end at his knees, chest bare and sweat clinging to every hair and fiber, running in rivers own his face.

"Well, good mornin', t'yeh."

He was so far gone into that dream that he turned with hope to see Sansa, even after hearing that broken, lilting voice. Instead a pale, weather-beaten creature with far-set eyes and a stinking poultice in her hands regarded him coolly.

"Wasn't thinkin' you'd be up fer a while, if'm'speakin' truth." She said, gathering a steaming glob of her concoction onto the end of a strange little brush, then gesturing to him. "Well, get ye back down on the mattress, man. Time to take yer-"

Sandor snarled, instincts still crackling, anger and frustration blotting out his fear. There was only one way he knew to deal with confusion, and so his hand shot out, easily encompassing her neck, teeth pulled back in a fury. The woman's eyes widened as his burns seemed to throb and withe across one side of his face, breath coming hard and heavy.

"Shut the fuck up and tell me where-"

Then he felt it. Something thin and sharp touching the pulsing vein at his throat. His eyes moved slowly, as if even swivelling them were risking a nick. The woman's face was still calm, eyes lidded and firm beyond the hand that gasped the short dagger.

"Yeh've got the look of a warrior about ye, a fool could see that. So y'know what that little vein is. What'll happen if I cut it. And y'know I will before you could crush the life outta me, and then where'd we be? Days wasted, I'd say. Now... leggo..."

They stared and stared and pushed each other with naught but will. Sandor was used to men and women quailing within moments once he turned his visage upon them. The horror, the violence of it, the stamp of evil was too much to bear. But this woman just blinked, very quickly, and her hand did not tremble. 

_Old bitch means what she says. Probably fucking done it before._

Without a word, his grip lessened... then left her throat... and his hand dropped to his side. The woman smiled thinly, and her hand lowered. 

_Unwise, my fucking lady-_

His hands burst forward again and the engine that ran him simply... seized. Whatever shock or fear had powered him past his dreams gave up in harsh waking. Like a log jammed in a windmill's gears, he felt his guts and breath shudder then stop, his limbs seize as if in chain and he coughed up-

-more than just spittle-

"Great Gods, man," she said with a sigh, sliding away from him as smoothly as a stone gliding over ice. "That was good mutton, that was..."

Sandor felt his mind begin to fracture, breaths coming out even more ragged. He was... weak. He couldn't hold his arms up without trembling, half out of the bed, half on the floor... barely able to brace one arm on the thatch and mud floor without feeling his torso sink down with it. But still he flexed-

-and daggers sunk deep into his arm and gnawed viciously.

The big man bellowed and cursed every fucking shit-stained, piss-drinking god under the fucking sun, and their followers _and_ their shriveled parts. Red sparks blinded him and he grasped his arm, feeling the dried poultice there... and the gouges under them, still fresh and tender. But he felt more there... festering flesh and...

"Poi... Poison...?"

The woman shook her head, coming back to the man that had twice moved to her in violence as if he'd just woken up again. She lifted his arm with surprising strength and scratched away the faded mud pack. Sandor's nose crinkled as the stench he'd feared issued from it.

"Will... Will you have to-"

"No, not if you don't do anythin' bloody stupid again," she said with a stern expression, not a glimmer of fear in her eyes as he glared. "Beastie that sunk its teeth into ye? Then don't have... what yeh'd call venom. Poison, like a snake. But their guts make muck that leaks into their mouths. Helps them eat big things, I think. Lotta' that got into yeh when he grabbed yeh. S'now we've gotta clean it-"

"Sansa. Where..." He swallowed. Gods, all the deserts of Dorne were never as dry as his throat in that moment. Every word ached and scratched and tore at him but he cared not. Barely noticed. He had to know or that last shred of his mind would...

"Where-"

The curtain above the floating house opened, and she was there. 

 

++++++++++

 

"I would never have believed it, my Lord."

"Oh?" Reed said, unable to keep the note of teasing humor from his sonorous tones. "And did you think all House Reed crouched in huts and hovels, my Lady?"

She could have imagined the time her cheeks would have flushed and a great gush of apologies would have babbled from her to make recompense. But then she saw his eyes, the quick, sly humor in them... and thought of her father, in those stolen moments. Without his duty and his honor to weigh down his thoughts. When he could simply be Eddard Stark, not Lord, or Hand.

"My father spoke of Greywater Watch," she said, and smiled as if mentioning him without tears were a milestone. "He'd never seen it either. I thought it was a story, like giants or the Others-"

"So you _did_ believe we lived in huts and hovels?"

Her sharp blue eyes slid to him and her sly smirk matched his own. "I did not think much on it at all... my Lord."

Howland's lips quirked and wrestled from side to side in amusement, before finally nodding his concession and refilling her cup. They sat on something that was like a cross between a dock and a marketplace. She knew that beneath their table and the mud it sat upon, there was boards and beams and thick layers of thatch feet and yards thick... but for all its stoutness, it was manmade. It floated, and they floated with it. 

_All of it does. The stories... they were right._

Yet again her gaze swept from side to side in a slow arc, taking in the stockade walls, the short tower of limestone patched and colored by vines and moss, the houses of rude stone and, to her amazement, a stable. The ponies were strange, willowy things, trotting high and quick like beasts unused to firm ground... and all of them kept a generous distance from their latest addition, a black warhorse the size of two of them put together, at least. Around the short tower and the stables were huts and houses that were, indeed of thatch and mud, but there was no poverty she could see. No beggars nor idle smallfolk puttering about.

The crannogmen were beings of activity. They lived in a place that would have very much liked to eat them all, but they had survived. No, more than that.

_They're prospering. My house has fallen, the North is tearing itself apart and the South is even worse... but the bog devils are thriving._

"Your thoughts grow loud, Lady Sansa."

She snorted softly at his words. Had she really let her mask slip so far in his presence? 

"I... envy you, I think," she said, words a whisper, almost like she was making some terrible confession. Her eyes did not rise when she went on. "The war hasn't touched you, here. You are still... whole. You can hide, and no-one troubles you." She looked up and saw sorrow in his face. "Sorry, my Lord, I didn't-"

"I know it can seem that way, my child," Howland Reed said, and there was a temperance in his voice born of true wisdom. "Oh, we have lost. We have suffered. My children, they..."

Only then did his voice crack. Sansa had thought the man so composed and genial that nothing could mar that surface, but with that last word that mask cracked and crumbled. He looked down into his cup and shook his head. A resignation there. Not grieving, Sansa thought, but... something harder to bear.

_He does not think he will ever see them again._

"It... does not matter. I did not lose my father, my brothers, my sister. My mother." He shook his head as if disgusted, rubbing his face from craggy crown to scratchy beard. "And men wonder why our folk stay hidden. Wonder why we don't play this damn stupid, poisonous game, when all that comes of it is death and misery."

Sansa smiled, and the sadness of all those deaths was in it. "Men seek power. They seek glory. In glory they will live forever, and make their names last in their children and _their_ children."

Howland cocked an eyebrow and nodded. "You've learned something of the game, haven't you?"

Her eyes shone for a moment, but then were eclipsed just as fast. "If that were the case, my Lord... I would not have lost so often. Or so much."

Howland nodded his sympathies and they went back to their conversation. Sansa was amazed at just how much had transpired without her knowledge, either due to her flight with Sandor or that which Littlefinger kept from her. Stannis and an army of sellswords smashing a Wildling onslaught at the Wall. Tywin Lannister murdered by Tyrion; Tyrion himself vanished like smoke in a storm; Cersei as regent and growing more drunken with wine and bitterness and power every day. Yet another pretender-invader, another heir to the Targaryen's, landing in the South with yet more sellswords.

Yet Sansa only had sharp ears for his tales from the North. How Winterfell had been sacked and burned. How the Houses Bolton and Frey gripped their country in a stranglehold. Then the older man had licked his lips and she saw hesitation there.

"My Lord...?"

"My Lady... your sister. Arya." A deep breath, and he closed his eyes before he answered. "She is married to Ramsay Snow."

Sansa blinked. Her breath stalled. She had to remind herself to exhale. At first it came out almost like a light laugh, like she couldn't believe it. True enough. Then she shook her head, as if blurring her teary eyes would wipe away this... this...

"The Bolton Bastard? No... No, Lord Reed, you are wrong, my family would-" He looked at her sadly, and her words stopped. No. They _wouldn't_. "I... I have... heard tale, of what that... that thing, does. Has he-"

Her voice began to tremble to hard it could almost break apart and Howland's hand reached out to embrace her own, shushing her as one would a mare. She looked into those small, bright eyes, and that smile that was balm and truth to her.

"She escaped," he said, and his smile grew at her own, "Some rescue was made, I know not by whom. Some say wildlings, others ironborn, sellswords... I know not, nor care. I'd scarce say any company would be preferable to Ramsay Snow-"

Then screaming split the air and every crannogman's head jerked up like dogs with a scent. Even as she rose in surprise, Sansa had to marvel at that. The Starks liked to boast of having ears and eyes and noses like direwolves, but these swamp people... they could never turn it off. Every waking _and_ sleeping hour they had The Stranger stalking them, and their whole lives through, they danced round him. Always prepared. 

Then her admiration soured when she realized where it had come from. And the word that was mixed in with the frenzied shouts. 

She came to the curtain at the healer's hut - _healer, not maester_ , the old woman had said with a disapproving sniff, _I'm not some self-gelded bloody man..._ \- and swung it open. He was awake! For days he'd not opened his eyes, save for those few awful dreams where he stared sightlessly into his own thoughts, and all Sansa could do was mop his brow and hold his hand. She'd fed him when the healer was busy elsewhere, and every hour she would peek in through the curtain, willing, wishing, wanting, praying...

Now he was awake. He lay panting on the bed, and the fear in his eyes stripped away the horror of his ruined face. Sansa approached him and he lurched upward, heedless of the complaining woman still applying poultice. He grunted in pain but still reached up, hands gripping her upper arms and-

She frowned. He seemed to be... looking _around_ her, as if she were being stalked. Then his hands felt her own as if she were spoiled, or wounded and-

"Sandor?!" Finally she shrugged out of his grip and looked at him agog. "What is the matter with you?!" 

His mouth worked frantically but no noise came out. Sansa had never seen him so... beyond his wits. Without his disdain or his anger to hide behind, and she reached out finally, gripped his hand in hers-

-and he held fast to her. Almost desperate. 

"Where..." He cleared his throat and some of his scraping timbre returned. "Where are we?"

"Greywater Watch, they took-"

"What's that?"

"... hmm?"

Sandor's eyes clouded, became a killing black, it seemed, and he pointed to her brow. " _That_. That bruise. Did they fucking _hit_ you?"

She knew no soft words nor redirection would work with him; not when he was so close to clambering out of bed onto legs he didn't really have and seek out a man who, well...

"That was you."

Sandor stared at her. The healer woman groused and grumbled under her breath and the fire crackled and hissed but he did not speak. Just blinked. Then swallowed.

"... are you sure?"

"Yes! I am sure! You're not a hard man to miss, Sandor!"

That was a mistake: Sandor could feed off anger like cows would a spring meadow. He scowled again and shook his hand from hers, settling back onto his undersized mattress. "Well, I don't _remember_. Had this... _gut-muck_ in me, whatever this mad woman says it is. Playing tricks with my mind-."

"This _mad woman_ saved your arm and most likely your life," Sansa said with her hands on her hips, in no mood to be growled at by a lame dog. "And since when would visions make you _hit me_ , hmm?"

"I don't fucking know, do I?! _You_ were there, _you_ tell me!"

"Oh, by The Builder's balls..."

Both of them turned sharply to the healer woman, who shoved the jar and brush and stinking sludge into Sansa's hands and made for the curtain. "Get it good and covered," she said over her shoulder, literally wiping her hands of them both on a towel by the entrance. "And clean out the fester, Like I showed yeh..."

"Madam! I don't-"

Then she was gone. Sansa looked down at the bubbling brown stuff and forced numerous unpleasant possibilities from her mind. Instead she sat by Sandor, already sulking and brooding as before, and reached out for his arm... and waited...

"Do you want your arm to turn to rot?"

"I can wait for her."

"If that was so, she'd not ask me to do it."

"Oh? And you're a fucking maester now?"

" _Healer_ , not maester-"

"Oh, same sodding thi-"

"Sandor Clegane give me your _fucking arm!_ "

His jaw made a little clicking sound as it dropped. The voice of every septa she'd had scolded her at once, until her mother joined the fray... but they were all dead. That was what she had to do and gods, it did feel good. Finally putting some coarseness and vulgarity to good use, expelling it like a quarrel from a crossbow. Then she cleared her throat and stirred the brush in the jug.

"... please."

He did what she asked and she went to work. Every now and then she'd feel a prickle on her face and look to see him quickly glance away. But it wasn't that he turned, or he was caught. It was that fragment he saw, that fleeting feeling, hiding from her like a deer in a forest.

She couldn't name it, but it was like Sandor never wanted to stop looking at her.

 

++++++++++

 

He hated coming back. The past was so much better. Of course, it was bloody and cold and wet and fearful, but he knew it was passed. He could pick and choose there, but no matter how much he wanted to stay, his eyes opened and the memories melted-

Then he was back in that room. Two morning's later than intended. There was but a flagon on the table, and even that wasn't finished. He didn't want to spend the night drunk then wake up late to find the _Golden Shite_ or whatever the fuck it was called had sprung without him, payment or no.

So his thoughts were clear when he rose. His armor laid out on a chair, and under it. Longsword on the table, bastard sword on the bed next to him, dagger under his pillow...

_Getting used to living like every night might bring an assassin, are we? Good._

Sandor got to his feet and washed his face. The battered, ruined mirror cast back a hundred of himself and he sighed slowly. He touched his left arm, where there were still white gouges and pits in his flesh. He smirked and snorted gently. One of the few men in the North who bore the jaws of a lizard-lion and emerged from it alive. Many would take pride in that, he thought.

He remembered the beast. The crannogmen who'd saved them. But clearest of all he remembered her healing him, her voice floating through the darkness of his fitful sleeps, her hair and her eyes when she'd tended to him. Him, of all the wretched souls she'd been saddled with.

Sandor remembered the dream and his guts went cold. His throat tightened and a fear he'd hid for ten years came back and tried to strangle him.

_It's different now. She's safe. Those monsters... they won't come back. They're gone._

_There are always monsters._

It was a quarter-hour before he could breath normally again, gather his wits and have them march in a straight line. There was more to think of now. Wounds he never thought he'd feel, from hands he never dreamed would wield them. 

There was a yell of Braavosi from the dock, and that was prophecy enough for that day. Sandor began strapping on his armor, paid his bill, walked from the tavern and down the pier, lying to himself every step of the way. 


	7. Chapter 7

As expected, her shield was not a difficult man to track. A few visits to the harbor-side taverns and the innkeepers nodded their heads and, between "Your Grace's" and "my Lady's", told her of the hideously scarred man who'd come to their town, drinking and brooding in the corner when he wasn't seeking passage.

"Passage to where?"

The last innkeeper had shrugged his shoulders, saying that he wasn't one to linger around a conversation with " _that_ sort". Sansa clenched her jaw and willed herself not to snap at the man. What did _he_ know of Sandor? Just what she saw and what his few grunted words alighted to. He did not know him; none of them did. 

_Sharp steel and strong arms rule this world, don't ever believe any different._

His words came to her, clear and harsh as the day he'd spoken them. A hard creed for a hard man, but she doubted he would have survived without them... and thus, neither would she have. 

"Whom did he speak with?"

"Couple a' captains. Come 'ere now and then, spend a few days wh-er, _carousing_ , m'lady."

"Indeed. These captains, do you know if they are here still?"

The man craned back his head and looked to the ceiling, as if tipping his skull could jog his memories. Eventually he spoke again.

"Well, there was... Mathos, Myrrish fella. He left for home the day before-" Hands squeezed her heart and once again she put up her mask. Long ago had she stopped wearing her emotions so plainly, but here, with him as their source, gods, it was hard. "-and there was Vilitus, er... Pentoshi. He's sailing for Braavos come the morrow. Ah!" A snap of his fingers and the man smiled, pointing a triumphant finger at the sky. "And this man you seek was talking with him last night. Even gave him some coin, if I recall..."

_Braavos. Gods. He's going to do it. Just like he said._

 

++++++++++

 

"Stranger's _cock_ what a fuckin'... _kff!_ "

Whatever it was, it wasn't Dornish sour, that was for true. It was bitter and sharp and burned all the way down like oil, but by the time he'd swallowed he could feel the fuzziness sink into his limbs and knew it was woking. Gods, but he'd still give his scrote for a skin of Arbor Gold...

Sandor's blood had been without wine for too long. His hands were ever on the verge of tremble and all the deadened thoughts they drowned were groping their way back to the service. It was worse when he was on his back, helpless and exhausted, his arm stinging and nothing to do but study the thatch ceiling. 

As soon as he could, he stole from the hut and asked around until he found a crannogman sipping from a skin. The little man who barely came up to his throat offered it to him. He took the whole thing and then went wandering away, leaving the man's protests behind.

_She wouldn't like that._

He ground his teeth at the words that came unbidden in his mind. Fuck what she liked. Fuck her indignation. Wasn't natural, leaving a man so long with a fuck, a fight or a chance to sozzle his thoughts. Greywater Watch swayed under him after a while and he kept his feet moving, ignoring the glances and mutters that followed him.

_Fucking swampers. Marshy little bastards with their craven poisons._

_They saved you. Without them you and the girl would be lizard shit by now._

"Fuck off!"

A crannogman passing jumped like a frog at his snarled words, looking him up and down and silently demanding an answer. Sandor's bleary eyes found him, his tongue twisted around an apology but all that came was a grunt. The little man watched the biggest he'd even seen lurch onwards, heading beyond the walls of the Watch. Well, that wouldn't do.

He didn't go far. Insensible as he was, he knew well the dangers of the Neck by now. Snakes and bloodflies and nipping little pests were the best of it. He stayed from the streams and he walked with care, avoiding those patches of innocent sand that could swallow a horse like stranger with a hungry sucking. 

But he couldn't be there anymore. Not around her.

_Where else can you go?_

Sandor slumped to his knees in the morass of green and brown and grey water, skin limp in his hand. That dream... that fucking dream. It wouldn't go away. Whenever he closed his eyes he saw her face, pleading for him, begging him and he... he had to watch. Helpless as a child, as he was when Gregor had burned him down to the bone, as he was when his sister had her "accident" and one look at Gregor's face, and he knew...

"I can't..." He said to the marsh, shaking his head, speaking so low not even a lizard could have heard him. "I'm not..."

_But you can be, Sandor Clegane._

His head snapped up and he looked around, skin falling from nerveless fingers. The voice... he hadn't heard it; he'd felt it. Words as old as stone and soft as wind had trembled through him. They were not the drunken musings that plagued him, before he completely doused his wits. He looked around and found no watchers, no fucking children playing tricks-

Just a carved face with bleeding eyes, ringed by red leaves and curling, choking vines. But they dared not mummify that face. 

For longer than he wished, Sandor sat there, panting and staring and convinced he'd finally gone mad. Maybe there was something else in that brew; he wouldn't put it past the bog devils. He sniffed the skin... then sniffed his wounds... frowned...

That smell. Woods and ash, and something else. Every time they applied the poultice to his arm, his nose tingled with it. Now he smelled it again. Coming from the tree.

"... that was... part of it?"

_The crannogmen are resourceful indeed. They know well the properties of their land._

Sandor had heard tale for years of visions and prophecies, and the drunks or maniacs that spouted them. Always he'd sneered and tipped back the rest of his cup, shaking his head at those fools who cloaked their fears in the gods, old, new or fucking imported. 

"My dream..."

_Protect her._

Again he shook his head, head low and hair hanging down his face. What could he protect? What did he know about _guarding_ life? He'd fled from Joffrey, fled from her... even the wolf-bitch had left him to die when he was drunk and wounded and begging her for the gift. 

"I'll... I don't-"

_She needs you, and you need her. They buried the Hound. That man died._

"I am no knight," he ground out the words, and for the first time there was a longing in them. The dust of the time he'd spun tales with his sister, and by the fire they'd cast shadows of dragons and bandits for him to slay. "That's... what she needs."

_A knight is a word. A dream or a lie, it matters not. Deeds define a life, and yours have been black and soaked in pain._

Sandor lifted his eyes and he watched the sap ooze from wooden eyes. 

_But it is not over._

"... Sandor?"

 

++++++++++

 

She'd never imagined to see Sandor at prayer. Pissing in a stream or slashing absently at the grass, maybe, or just sitting under a tree getting more and more stewed... these were all likely possibilities. But when she followed the finger of the crannogman and found him not far beyond the walls of Greywater, that was the only word she could think of.

The big man, huge even as he was on his knees, looking up at that ageless face and... she could hear muttered words beyond the gently rustling leaves. Not the tones of prayer, but almost... talking. Conversing.

All the anger and frustration that had been in every stomp of her feet drained out of her at the sight of him. She'd composed her words in detail after she'd left Lord Reed's keep and found a crannogman bitterly chattering to another about "that big 'un takin' my grog". Then another had scurried up to her and let her know he was talking to himself... holding a wine skin.

"Do not worry," she'd said through gritted teeth, lips pressed hard together. "I'll deal with him."

Gods, how far she had come. She'd barely been able to look at him when they first met; now she marched to face him, admonish him and what's more, knew she could do it.

_Well, it was a nice plan while it lasted..._

She spoke his name and he turned to her slowly. Eyes as if waking from a dream. He blinked and she frowned. He didn't _look_ drunk. When he rose to his full height, towering over her by over a foot, there was no sway or stumble. But the wineskin in his hand sloshed a little, so he knew he'd been pulling hard at it.

He didn't speak. He walked towards her, closer and closer, and something burned in his eyes that made her hand go to her throat.

"S-Sandor, are you-"

"Were you in earnest before?"

"... a-about what?"

"My serving as your sworn shield," he said, face carefully immobile, save for his eyes. "Did you mean it?"

She studied his face for a long time. Saw feelings there that made her shake her head and when his brow crunched she knew he thought she was mocking him. So she held up and hand and then gestured to him. All of him. Both sides of his face, wounded and able, sword and flesh. 

"Who else would I trust so far?"

At her words his brow smoothed and the tension vanished from his jaw. His eyes still smoldered but she could almost hear his heart slow, and he licked his lips, nervous. 

"Then I am yours," he said, words coming so fast she had to blink a few times to make them clear, and then was sure she'd been mistaken. So he clarified further, stumbling along like a man who'd never said a vow in his life, and had been proud of it: "As long as you will have me, as long as I can swing my sword and... protect you, I will not leave you." He shook his head and there was a steel worthy of the North in his eyes. "Not again."

Sansa gaped at him. She didn't know what else to do. Often she had hoped that her surly protector would say such words, and she'd have no need to fear his absence again. But those hopes had been crushed before; first when he fled King's Landing, and after, when he found her again and escorted her, but... that was all it was. Escorting her as if she were a package to be delivered. Nothing knightly or noble, and whenever she had tried to fashion such from his actions, he'd cut her down.

"I... Sandor-"

"I'm not one for fucking vows or kneeling and I don't have a shield," he said, voice as gruff as ever. Clearly a little moment in front of a face-bearing tree wouldn't tame all of him. "So that'll have to do."

She smiled up at that craggy face. She saw the scars, but didn't notice them. She reached up and cupped his jaw on the smooth side, not wanting him to pull away. As she did his lips parted just a fraction... and he did not move. Sansa nodded her head, just once, so it was almost a bow, and her eyes shone.

"It is more than enough."

 

++++++++++

 

Sandor didn't like it, but then again, he didn't like much when it came to lords and fucking ladies. 

"How do we know he can be trusted?"

"Anyone can betray," Lord Reed said in that irritatingly patient tone of his. The man may have the trust of Sansa but Sandor's didn't come so easily. "But I do not think the Manderly's are so inclined."

Sandor snorted at that, taking another sip from his cup. It was only half-empty after nearly an hour. Quite an improvement. "Aye, and I bet plenty thought the same of the Boltons. Look how _that_ turned out."

Little bastard wasn't going to rise to him, either. Just fixed him with those deep brown eyes and spoke as steady as always. 

"House Manderly has been as loyal to the Starks as mine has. No firmer friend would Lady Stark find outside of my own house, and no-one more likely to aid her."

"Aid her in what? Another marriage? Don't imagine Stannis'll like that."

"Stannis is more concerned with the Boltons, or I would be. Roose Bolton is Warden of The North, and he holds Winterfell." Sansa's eyes sparked at that and Sandor felt his unease rise again. He didn't need her getting any fucking fool notions to go riding home right in the path of an army. Or two. "That will be Stannis' first thought, I'd wager."

"You wager more than _coin_ ," Sandor said, voice barely above a snarl now, Lord or not. "You wager her _life_."

Now Howland rose, eyes as angry as that big fucking lizard when it came for him-

"My Lord?!"

But Sansa rose just as quickly, dress rustling as she held out a hand, catching him lightly by the shoulder. She tilted her head until he turned from Sandor.

"It is my decision, is it not?"

"Yes, My Lady."

Sansa breathed in deeply, and to Sandor's eyes it looked as thought she enjoyed the sound of that. Her decision. Her choice. The freedom to make it. He didn't want to think about how long that would last.

"Then we will go to White Harbor. Stannis holds the Wall, as far as you know, and Jon will be beyond my reach. Stannis is no Joffrey or Bolton, but he wants _all_ ," she said, and her eyes turned to Sandor when she spoke. He looked back at her, chewing the corner of his bottom lip. "From the North to Dorne. He'll take nothing less, and when a man plays for stakes that large, the heir to Winterfell will be nothing to him but some piece on the board."

Sandor blinked back his astonishment. Was it Sansa Stark or a lord he listened to now? 

Then she set her jaw straight and let back her shoulders, auburn hair flecked with scorched red tumbling down her shoulders. She rarely wore it in a bun or tail anymore. He'd noticed. But her eyes... they were as firm as her words. Steeled for what was ahead, and most of all, believing them.

"And _I_ am not to be used. Not anymore. Lord Wyman is a friend to us, you say?"

"Such is the message I received, My Lady. He could not say much, but..." Howland licked his lips and nodded to himself. "His tone was one of conspiracy. Only House Reed and House Manderly still have some hope for the Starks, some loyalty. Lord Wyman has bent the knee to Roose, but..."

"But what? Doesn't sound good to _me_."

Lord Howland shot him another dart-filled look but settled in his seat. Only once he had did Sansa do the same, and the look she threw his way made Sandor shuffle his arse on the wicker seat. 

"But he does not have the Neck to hide in, nor centuries of practice in bleeding his enemies by slow, venomed inches. We do. We have that path. He does not." A twisted, bitter smile crossed his face. "You mentioned the Red Wedding, did you not? Every man there bent the knee to Robb Stark. Half of them betrayed, and half died with him."

"So you'd have us trust a man who-"

"Would lie?"

Sandor's words on Sansa's tongue. Her eyebrow quirked and there was a dark amusement there. 

"Such is the farce a man must play when he plots against House Bolton, Sandor. I remember Lord Wyman. I remember his loyalty... and I remember the son he lost at the hands of the Boltons and the Freys." She turned to Lord Reed and by his eyes, she saw him give a short nod like she were at a war council. "Send word back if you can. Regardless, can you arrange passage from the coast to White Harbor? It would be safer than land."

"That I can, my Lady."

Howland's voice shone with a quiet admiration. Sandor's mouth quirked on his good side, and when she met his eyes again, he gave her a nod of his own and a pat on the hilt of his sword.

_Where you go, I follow, little bird._

 

++++++++++

 

Their party clattered and tore down the streets and she cared not for the commotion. She knew the Manderly's would hear of her arrival soon; hells, the whole city would! The Queen in the North, with a handful of bannerman, riding hard from Winterfell to White Harbor and for what? To track down a burned man, a job a hundred, a thousand others could have done, and did, every day. The whispers start, the rumors, all of them finding the ears of lords and houses.

Sansa knew they would use it, regardless of what truth was in the bile they concocted. The North would stand beside her but the south? The royal court and beyond? Such were fertile grounds for gossip and sickening twistings of the truth. 

Willas would hear of it, too. He would question her and she did not know if she could look that kind, noble man in the face and lie.

But still she rode. Carts and donkeys and those afoot scattered and jabbered in their wake, but she barely slowed. The morning tide was going out and the wind favored a departure. She turned Frost hard onto the pier and the boards shook and groaned in protest, her eyes searching... searching...

_A galley, he'd said. Pentoshi make, with ports for oars and two sails and a gold slash across-_

Sansa's felt a gasp torn from her throat and tears sprang to her eyes. Only her muscle's memory brought the horse to a halt, iron shoes gouging into the wood as she looked beyond the pier-

-and saw the _Golden Fish_ showing it's yellow arse to the north, plowing east through fair waters.

"No..."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Urgh. Didn't really like his one. Something missing. As always, critique and opinions would be very welcome. This bugger is fast becoming the plant from The Little Shop of Horrors, but I still have so much left! And please lemme know, you Machiavellian connoisseurs, if you think my logic was sound with the politickin' towards the end. 
> 
> Oh! And here's an awesome little video I found, for all you diehard SanSanErs...  
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3zV4y5v9tvU


	8. Chapter 8

She knew someone was speaking, but she couldn't make out the words. 

All she could hear were the waves ceaselessly crashing, the gulls endlessly shrieking, a potpourri of languages from across the Narrow Sea jabbering around her on the creaking dock. Even Frost's little whinnies and snorts sounded like gusts of wind buffeting her, as she sat astride him, eye fixed on the slowly shrinking galley. 

They mocked her. Every sound. She'd been so close. She'd driven her men and their horses until they were drenched in sweat and it was... it should have been...

_Life is not a song._

Sansa heard his words, his voice in her head. The same cruel words he'd snarled at her so many years before, joined by countless more as what grew between them sprouted with such fragility, then grew...

_Grew into what? This?_

She fet rain on her hands clutching the bridle, but the sky was flawless. She blinked and the drops were warm. She would never hear that voice again. Never see his lips stretch and quirk in that fierce smile, the one that lit his eyes like beacons in mist, shining just for her. She would never touch him again and know his scent. The strength and warmth the world ignored or derided, but she knew, she had seen it.

She felt her head slump between her shoulders, and the voice became clear. Mayhap it was him, at her back. Mayhap he was still there, he'd changed his mind and-

"My Queen?"

She turned and saw Merrick there instead, cantering his horse gently forward until he was at her side. His frown was a stamp of nervous confusion. Rarely had anyone seen her cry. She was the Queen in the North; she _was_ the North, and there was no place for weakness in that hard realm. Now her man-at-arms saw tears coursing from blue eyes, like ice melting. For an instant there was no barriers of station nor birth between them. He was a man seeing a woman cry, and he knew not why, only that he wished it to stop. 

"He's... He's gone."

"Aye, my Lady," he said, as gently as he dared, resting a hand on her shoulder as he would his wife when they lost their second. "I'm sorry."

She waited for her ragged breaths to fuel her rage. She thought back on all the times when her anger had driven her. At Winterfell. At White Harbor. Places in between that held no names nor markers save bleached bones and rusted weapons. She longed for it; that flame to quench this sorrow, this grief that threatened to split her in two. 

It did not come. Some wounds have no balm.

Sansa put a hand over her mouth and wept into it, great shaking sobs that seemed without end, her bannermen watching on in mute surprise, as the _Golden Fish_ took him away from her.

 

++++++++++

 

"You're becoming quite the hassle, little man..."

Stranger huffed at him and tossed his mane. Sandor quirked an eyebrow and patted his flank, easing the big stallion up the plank to the waiting cog. The crew of the vessel eyed him with wary eyes. Northmen, true but unused to such a looming beast trotting about on their ship. They skittered from his path when Sandor led him down towards the cargo hold and Sandor rolled his eyes.

_Gods, you'd think he was raised on snipped cocks and baby brains. Bloody sailors._

The small part of crannogmen had led them through marsh and swamp that held terrors unknown as if it were a clear field in plain day. Sandor's eyes were constantly searching for moving logs, slithering scales, the hint of armor or movement... but there was nothing. The bog devils knew well their land, and by the end of the day the marsh finally ended. Hugging vines and trees packed so close together you had to squeeze by them thinned, and then he heard the distant splashing... rhythmic.

"The sea."

"Aye," he said, without looking at the figure ever by his side, "About fucking time..."

"These men are in Lord Wyman's employ," Howland Reed told them as they said their farewells on the black sand, clutching at Sansa's hands. "They know to take you to White Harbor, berth at a discreet pier nearby. His men will await you."

Sandor stared hard at those words, at him and the seat dogs they were to be traveling with. Men waiting. That had more than one meaning for him, and he fingered the bastard sword on his belt out of habit. But Sansa had no fear. Her lips spread like a slow sunrise and she bent to press a kiss onto each of the crannog-lord's nut-brown hands. His eyes softened and she pressed on to his cheek.

Sandor felt his own burn for a moment. On his bad side.

"Any thanks I offer would-"

"Hardly be necessary," Lord Reed said, quietly but firmly, as was ever his way. He cupped her cheek and something more than affection glittered in them. "You are our hope, dear child. The heir to Winterfell. The daughter of the finest man I ever knew."

She blinked a little more than she needed to and Sandor turned away. He'd been there, that bright morning when her world was forever shattered. He'd stood by with his face as seamless as stone, just watched as Lord Eddard lost his head and Joffrey had his war over... nothing. No, worse than nothing. Spite. Whim. _Amusement_. 

"My lady," he said finally, harsh voice so at odds with the crannogmen, "The tide waits for no-one."

Sansa said her last farewells and walked swiftly up the gangplank. The wind filled sails loosed from their ropes and the sullen sea dogs were in motion, an intricate ballet of heaving and grunting and clambering up rope ladders and planks hammered into the masts that Sando could barely follow. He felt the scrape of stone and shale through the bottom of the cog as the sailors angled their sails just so, and....

Still, solid boards were replaced with a gentle slide into the water... and they were rolling under Sandor in a way that made him grateful he'd let alone the wineskin that morning.

"You've been at sea before?"

"I... Yes..." He managed to bite out, armor throwing off his balance a little as he made his way to the rail beside her. She did not take her eyes from the clutch of small, watchful men and women that marked their passing. Even when they finally turned and vanished into the thick treeline, as if they were the children themselves. "When I was younger. The Greyjoy Rebellion."

Sansa smiled, but sadly. Sandor remembered after a moment that Theon, Balon's heir, had been a friend of hers. Brother in all but blood to King Robb, if he'd heard right... and he repaid that loyalty with the murder of Robb's _true_ blood.

"Is it... always so..."

"Hard not to retch over the side?"

"I didn't..." She tried to finish but then the cog plunged onward and Stranger whinnied his complaint from below. She seemed about ready to make the same sound. "Does it ever... slow?"

"Heh... no, not really, my lady. But you learn to bear it."

"If I had scales and gill may-"

He knew her footing wouldn't hold for long, and as another swell sent the prow jerking higher she stumbled-

-into his waiting arms.

He willed her not to look up at him. Not from so close. But she did, her mouth open in surprise, perfect curve of her lips mere inches from his own. That chaste, snatched thing from the darkened hut sprouted on his lips again. He bit down on his tongue lest he lick his own, but his hands gripped her tighter. To steady her. Of course.

_Yes. Of course._

"A... Apologies."

"No need, my lady," he said, looking away and turning so she could rest an arm in the crook of his own. "Below decks'd be better, for now."

"In case we are seen?"

"That and you spewing over the deck would be..."

"Unladylike?"

He turned, already smiling, and she answered with her own. 

_Roasted dog. Passion. Something sweeter..._

 

++++++++++

 

She noticed that he smiled more since that afternoon beneath the weirwood, but Sansa could see more to it than that... and not all of it comforted her. When they were among the crannogmen, or the sailors, his scowl never seemed to waver. Everyone that ambled close to her was subject to it, indifferent to age, sex or station. His hands forever caressed the handle of his sword and once when a sailor had lurched by mistake into her, his longsword was free from his back in a twinkling, harsh grey eyes burning above it. The man had paled to a corpse and backed hastily away, spewing apologies.

"That was unnecessary, Sandor."

He'd just grunted and sheathed his massive blade, tracking the man with his eyes until he was gone. 

But when they were alone... Sansa smiled on the top deck as she recounted their few nights, bobbing and rolling on the short stretch of sea between the coast of the Neck to White Harbor. In their cabin he'd been easier with her. The tension he crackled with during what he called "the open" relaxed from his shoulders. The scowl softened and retreated. He'd locked the door, of course, and was never without a blade close to hand, but he was... Sandor. 

They talked. He told her of his past, what little of it he was willing to share. He spoke to her of the Quiet Isle, the sanctuary he'd found himself on his flight from King's Landing. His eyes had evaded her when she asked how he, of all and sundry, could have come there, and he would not answer... but promised her he would.

He'd promised her. He'd vowed to her. Sworn himself. Words she'd never thought she'd link to Sandor Clegane, let alone her, and he was giving them to her. 

"Braavos."

She blinked and turned to him, standing at her side but with his back to the railing, watching the deck as she watched the undulating waves and the smear of grey and green land beyond them. 

"Pardon?"

"You asked before, where I would go after this. Braavos, most likely."

She did her best not to gape, but her eyes went wide as hen's eggs. She could not remember the last time he'd offered her an answer without a question a moment before, and that was if he chose to give it. Her mind, rather than her heart, spied some opening there. A chink in the armor he wore beyond metal. She feared to press but before she could hold herself-

"Why?"

"Good a place as any to find work as a sellsword. Free Cities are lousy with 'em. 'sides, I'm a wanted man every-fucking-where else."

The words came without grunts or that tension in his voice she'd grown so used to. He was... _talking_ with her. Just a conversation between two people. She grinned now, the weight of her years falling away, becoming a girl again, with a girl's laugh and lightness. Something from her lessons as a girl surfaced in her mind and under his frown she stepped to a bucket and held the paintbrush of tar-

Legs bent, standing sideface, one hand holding her fearsome weapon low, the other high next to her head, fingers splayed.

"What... by the gods and their bastards... are you doing?"

"You would be a bravo, Westerosi!" She laughed again as his jaw hung at her truly terrible Braavosi accent. "I have seen, in books! The way they hold their sword, like this... quick as cats and claws to match!"

A sardonic eyebrow answered her as slow eyes took in her... "form", if it could even be called that. Finally he sighed and shook his head, branch-thick arms crossed over his chestplate. 

"Going to have to teach you better than that shite, little bird."

"A-ha!" She said, something new sliding into her voice, pointing triumphantly with her "sword". "I was waiting for that."

"For what?"

"Little bird." Sansa didn't hide her blush that time. She was so tired of hiding things from him. "I haven't heard it for a while."

Something crossed over him like a cool breeze. His wry smile straightened and his arms hung by his side again. "That's... That's the past. I'm your shield now, my lady."

Gods, was that a sting she felt? She felt some twinge of panic, of _loss_ , and tossed the brush back into its bucket, closing the gap between them and easing her hand into his palm before she had a chance to gauge the moment. Blast and damn Littlefinger to all the hells,  but she'd taught him that much, at least. Watch reactions. Weigh them. Only then do you decide.

But he was not some... gods, she didn't even know. Sansa would not think of him that way, not after all he had done.

"Don't say it like that," she said, voice quiet and so close to pleading, squeezing gently. "Like it's... some corpse to be buried. I'm still your-"

"No, you are not," he said firmly, pulling himself free from her and casting his gaze away. "I am your sworn shield, and I've only been one for three bloody days, so I'm still learning. But I know enough that they don't call their liegewoman 'little fucking bird'."

For long moments she just stood there, feeling so utterly... foolish. Angry whispers and fears filled her mind, multiplied in her outrage and she drew from them, beating back the caution that she'd relied on and when she spoke it was with a coldness fit for the waves they glided over.

"Is _that_ what I am to you? Nothing but your new mistress?"

"That's the _point_ , isn't it?"

Sansa's eyes narrowed and suspicions bubbled in her eyes. Conclusions skewed and tainted hardened in them and his glower was no bar to her anymore. 

"I know I am more."

He took and breath and it came out angry through his nostrils. He didn't look at her. He stared at the deck as if it had done his mortal injury. But he did not speak, and that was worst of all.

"Answer me." Nothing. Sansa felt her chest heave and her breathing turn ragged. This... this wasn't fair! They'd laughed and joked and talked and now _this_?! "Answer me, Sandor!"

"Why not call me _dog_ , like Joffrey, and get it over-"

Her hand moved in a flash, nothing but red in her eyes. She heard a dry crack and her palm was on fire. His head tilted just a little and when his eyes came back to hers, a riot ran through them. First the outrage, then the swift discipline to _not_ cut her down, as he'd been trained to do since boyhood to any that struck him. Smoldering, steaming disdain, making his shattered face take on the mask of a daemon in its silent fury... and then, when her eyes filled with tears...

Sansa saw what he buried from her. From himself. She hung her head and hated herself for... drawing that from him. He sighed, sounding so tired, and he turned from her again.

"I know you care."

He bowed his head and closed his eyes. 

"I know. So why? Why... say it is the past? You are my sworn shield. Wouldn't that be-"

"I can't do my duty if I care... like _that_ ," his words were growled out as if they were teeth pulled from his head, but still he spoke them. His eyes flashed around himself, everywhere but her. "I can't have you... in my head, my... I can't. If I am your shield, it is simple. I protect you, I watch over you."

Sansa shook her head and willed the tears not to fall. "But there can be more."

Sandor swallowed so hard she saw every tremble of his throat as he did. His face clouded and something more akin to mourning that sadness settled over him like a shroud. He shook his head and his voice was so low she barely heard it over the splashing, frolicking waves. 

"You are an heir to the Great House of the North. I am without title, and by now without lands, I am sure. I'm a... well-trained commoner. Nothing more. Best not to dream of things you cannot have, my lady."

Again the term that was already so hateful to her, uttered though it was scarce few times. She felt something slipping away, something they'd built and nurtured almost without thought since that night in the Vale; something she'd held to her breast, precious and hers. Theirs.

She reached for him again and did not see his body tense and tighten.

"Sandor, that doesn't... we could-"

 

++++++++++

 

She wouldn't shut the fuck up. Still a girl at heart, he could see that now. Still with her dreams of maidens and heroes and favors and... and that one more thing he could not speak. Not even think. She didn't know what she spoke of. She thought that being heir to Winterfell meant the rules did not apply... gods, had she learned _nothing_? Even the whoremongerer and the Imp would have taught her different! 

Sandor had shaken his head and let his temper speak and his cheek stung but he held... he held... until he heard the hope in her words and it mirrored his own and-

"Enough!"

-his hand smacked so hard on the railing he was sure he heard something crack under it. Or was that something else. He looked on her with wide eyes, breathing shallow like a sick man, and that bitch, that fucking stupid girl, she'd shorn everything from him. He could see her wishful eyes begging him and he wanted to tear the eyes from his head. He wanted to hold her close and protect her. He wanted to take her to Braavos or Pentos or the Summer fucking Isles, away from this mad, endless war over an ugly metal chair. He wanted her to kiss him again. He _wanted_. 

So hard he could barely breathe. But life was not a song.

"We cannot," he said, and he winced as the words came out choked with... weakness. "I cannot."

"... why?"

Sandor knew the answers. Her birth. His station. The blood of a hundred generations of Northern royalty flowing in her veins. The noble houses that would judge her and cast aside her wishes in an instant if he marred her. The game, the cruel game and the stupid rules that crushed all love and life from men and women until they were naught but maester's scribbles in massive tomes of lineage and nobility. He knew all that, and he should have spoken it.

But Sandor did not. _A dog will not lie to you._

"If I serve you... I keep myself... safe," he said, and seemed to force himself to meet her gaze. He saw tears in her eyes and reached out to brush them away. She pressed herself to his hand for but a moment, and then he pulled away, leaving something behind. "But if... Sansa... if I..."

He shook his head. She was so confused. He couldn't... he couldn't make the words for her to understand. Even he didn't fucking understand them. Gods, where was the wine?

"If I failed you, and... we were more..." His eyes turned to stone. Like twin gravestones. "I would fall, and never rise again."

He walked away from her, but not so fast that he didn't hear the single, choked sob that escaped her lips. 

 

++++++++++

 

He didn't look back. He'd got Stranger on board and below decks and then went straight to his cabin. The captain had been grinning like a fucking baboon the whole time until Sandor tossed him another coin, with two simple requests.

Wine and silence. Immediately. 

Those he got, and he sat pulling hard at the bottle and gazing out the port window from his bed. He thought of Braavos and the stories he'd heard. Puffed-up bravos and courtesans that could enslave a man with a flutter of her eyes. Mazes of rivers and mysteries down every crooked alley. As he drank they became real to him, and he wandered them... but always he came to the thought, the hope, the fear, of her on that pier, rushing to stop him.

If he'd seen her, if she'd been there, if he'd looked back, he would have been lost. He knew himself that well, at least.

The Sun plunged down to the hells and its fires smote the waves as it passed, casting all in red and purple. Sandor sighed and lifted his pack from Stranger. There was food in there, and he was going to enjoy his last Westerosi meal. His hands burrowed deeper, sure there was some-

Something small, wooden and carved slid past his hands and onto the cabin floor. His eyes darted to it. He stared. Breathing slow and not daring to move. He reached down... and it was not a dream. It was there, so small in his ham-hock hands, delicate despite the roughness it had been crafted with.

He stroked the painted head and the liveried flanks. A life denied rushed into his mind and Sandor's face crumpled in on itself like a sack. 

He was lost.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'd really appreciate some critique for this one. I think I rushed it. Urgh! Working life SUCKS! 
> 
> Oh, speaking of which, chapters will be coming slower from now on. Probably one or two a week. I really don't wanna muck up my first story by rushing out a chapter every night. Heh, and yes, I know that sounds stupidly prolific to some of you, but damn... I never knew how addictive this place was!


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There are probably spoilers here for the TV show crowd, since I'm referencing characters that have only appeared so far in the books, including the last ones.

In his nightmares, he could taste it first. Gamey. Thick with fat. Still scorching his tongue and cheeks but gods, he still choked it down and bowed and vomited his thanks and the giant in black armor laughed and laughed. He tried to work his mouth around, spit, vomit, anything, but the taste remained. Too much juice; too much gristle, but in that place, men like he would fight over bites of it.

When he realized what it was, his eyes flashed open, and he was back in the dungeon.

Ragged, hopeless wraiths surrounded him. All of them chained, though some were emaciated past all movement, any thought of escape. Women cradled babes long dead, still murmuring nursery rhymes in an eerie, groundless tone until they too passed. Fathers offered daughters for their freedom, only to have their ravaged, bleeding spawn hurled back at them when the garrison was done rutting.

Screams in the courtyard. The endless, pointless questions from that ordinary man with black daemon eyes and curved hook. Crying. Sobbing. A choking reek of rot and flies and shit that never went away. Then they came for _him_.

The fat man tried to struggle but chains like boulders kept him still. Hands gripped his head steady and the giant was there again, sizzling, twitching morsel in a mailed hand the size of the prisoner's face. He sobbed and he begged but he was so hungry. They'd pushed them all so far, until their stomachs were eating themselves and he forgot he was a lord, a son, a husband, a father.

Just a fat man who didn't want to die. The giant smiled and his teeth were blades and hammers, cruel and without soul.

"More roast goat, for my fat little piggy?"

"Wylis? _Wylis?!_ "

He thrashed and strained and the chains turned to blankets, the hands to pillows-

-and there was Leona, beautiful and plump and distraught, sitting over him with tears in her lovely eyes.

"Wylis... it was but a dream, my love."

The fat heir to House Manderly pressed his lips together and turned from her. He didn't want her to see his shame, the tears that would spring because of it. The night terrors were passing, but so very slowly. Most nights his violated mind returned to Harrenhal, where The Mountain and his savages were waiting with eager smiles and their sick amusements. Sometimes they passed to oblivion and he did not wake. Other times...

"I'm... My... My Lady Wife, I-

"Shhh..." She said, shaking her head and pulled her head to her ample chest. Some fragment of the fire and wroth he bore when he first set forth with the Young Wolf stirred at being so handled, like a child, but it was not enough. Father and Mother, how he had missed her. "You're home, Wylis. You're safe."

"I'm sorry," he sputtered and blubbered through tears, soaking her woollen gown. "This-This is so... so..."

"My love," she said, voice as deep as one would expect from a lady of her berth, but no less gentle for it. She cupped his face and smiled down at him, wiping his tears with her thumbs. "You endured a beast. A _monster_ , well rid from the world. Many men died at his hands. _You_ survived him. But he left his mark, and deep in my beloved husband." Just as he was about to crumble again, she pulled his head up and her gaze hardened. "You need _never_ excuse yourself for surviving, my love. Not to me. Not to _anyone_. You did your duty. You made us all _proud_."

Wylis gazed at her with eyes that had once been so full, and now seemed ever etched in sorrow and darkness. He knew many wives endured dotard husbands because divorce was not practical between powerful houses, such as theirs. Houses Woolfield and Manderly shared long histories, including marriages, and they were stronger for it. But he had never been cursed with a marriage as loveless and staid as a sale of chattel. Wylis marveled at her. That she would still love him as much, if not _more_ , as she did when she waved her favor at him from the keep's gate, their children at her skirts, when he rode off to war. 

"Gods..." He said after a while, when his wits were ordered and he ventured a smile. "Never was a man so blessed."

She chuckled in that familiar way, jowls wobbling with mirth as she pecked his cheeks.

"Nor a lady, high or low. Now, back to bed, I think. Father Above, it's not even-"

Heavy knocking cut her off. Before the echo had faded Wylis' hand had flown to the dagger at his bedside, the one he could not be parted with. He did not see his wife's worried glance, just shouted out hoarsely: "Who goes?"

"Guyman, my lord," the servant said in muffled tones. "May I...?"

"Aye," said Wylis back, face grim now, dagger slid from table to covers and out of sight. "But carefully now..."

Guyman knew better than to test his lord's words. The Manderly heir had suffered horrors worse than any he'd known, to have been a plaything for The Mountain over almost a year. The booming and boisterous lord that left had returned a shade, with empty eyes and a twitch for every sharp noise. So he eased open the door slowly, and wide, letting his master see no-one was with him, just his pale face lit by the candle he carried. 

"Lord Wylis? Your guests have arrived."

Wylis threw off his covers, uncaring if Guyman saw the damn dagger anymore. He dressed in a flurry, the fright of moments nothing but bitter memory as he swept on a tunic and cloak and then sealskin boots on bare toes. He'd got to the door before he remembered Leona, and turned to see her staring after him with fearful ignorance etched painfully on her face, covers scrunched up in her hand up between her breasts. He remembered her fury at that old sea hawk, Seaworth. He could see it was fear that made her shriek and accuse him, not hatred or anger. She had nearly lost him, wretch that he was, and she would do anything to protect the man that had returned to her.

_She cannot know all, but I cannot inflict more on her._

He marched back with purpose in his step and gaze, determined to be the man she married, not this broken thing Tywin's Mad Dog had returned to White Harbor. He laid a hand on her shoulder and kissed her. Waited for her lips to part and smoothed his tongue against hers, feeling the rigid shoulder tremble and then crumble, her hand alighting to his cheek, as if she could gain purchase on the despair in him and brush it away. His mouth glided to her ear and he hugged her close.

"I will not be long, beloved wife. Fear not. Dark times are past us."

 

++++++++++

 

"Are you playing fucking games with me, boy?"

The drover looked like he dearly wished he was somewhere else, and Sansa could hardly blame him. Having a man a few inches shy of seven feet glaring down at you with a face like a wolf-savaged gargoyle was not a pleasant experience; especially when the cloak of night made him loom even larger. The cog creaked and swayed on the short pier behind them, the sailors already preparing to move on again, back down the White Knife to the harbor. 

The city there throbbed with light in the darkness, every torch and mounted brazier casting against the white stone and throwing moonlight up from the very ground. Sansa had not seen White Harbor in years, and would dearly have loved to walk those cobbled streets again. 

_Such is not the way of a fugitive, though. Speaking of which..._

"Th-Thats wh-what my lord bid-bid me, ser-"

"Don't fuckin 'ser' me, neither, boy," Sandor snarled, back to his brutish old ways to her complete lack of surprise. She couldn't even summon the energy to be angry at him anymore. Whatever weakness or opening he'd shown her in his anguished words on deck, he'd smothered it within an hour in sullen silence that stretched to the night and beyond. He spoke only when he had to and barely looked at her. He stood his post, he did his duty, but nothing more. "You mean t'tell me that your lord-"

"Please, s-ma-fellow!" The boy said back, groping for words even in his fear, holding up a warning hand. "Mayhap we are not the only ears to hear your words!"

Sandor looked fit to explode, lips pulling back from his teeth and Sansa rolled her eyes, stepping forward.

"If you think I give a cat's _cunt_ about-"

"Sir," Sansa slid between the two of them and pinned him with those eyes like beautiful daggers. The boy could do naught but nod dumbly. "I understand that you were sent by..." She tilted her head forward, mindful of his words and her own. Even Sandor, looming so close that his breath ruffled her hood, could barely hear. "... one of New Castle?"

"Y-Yes, m'lady," the drover nodded, both to the kind young lass and the big fucking monster. "I-I don't know why, b-but he said to bring you in and... and..."

"And shove us under a cart of fucking potatoes?"

The boy cleared his throat and looked back at the cart piled high with muddy ovals, some of them sprouting queer little roots that the ponies nibbled at now and then. He managed a helpless shrug and a flickering smile. 

"Well... they, ah... won't think to look _there_ , will they?"

 

++++++++++

 

"I hear any alarm, I smell a trap, _anything_ , and _your_ throat'll be laid open quick as a flyin' arrow, y'hear me, boy?"

"Sandor, stop spitting at the boy and _help me!_ "

He cast her a dark look, one of his best, and he thought of pebbles and plate armor again. She threw it right back at him without a word, struggling with a sack of potatoes nearly bigger than she was. She was small enough to fit in one of the empties, but he had to suffice with burying himself in the loose roots piled high on the cart. Now her dress was getting caught and she was wiggling frantically and he looked to the gods he didn't believe in and murmured: "Gods save me from noble ladies."

"What was that?"

"Nothing."

"Indeed..."

Gods. Mayhap that prayer had more urgency than he'd first planned. The frost in that word could have turned a river to ice, and Sandor glanced away for a moment, the closest he would get to contrition. Then he was before her, half-plate scraping softly as he bent low to shuffle the sack up over her feet as she sat... then her legs as she stood... her waist...

"Tuck yer arms in, m'lady."

"Now 'm'lady," she said in a mutter as surly as his own, and this time he blinked in surprise. "Not even ' _my_ lady'. Just 'm'lady', like some serving boy who won't look me in the eye."

Sandor's jaw clenched and his nostrils flared. He'd taken her sulking all the night before and all the day and he was sick to his _front_ teeth with it, let alone his _back_. She needed to understand how things were, how they would _always be_. If that meant he had to keep his words to her more formal (well, as formal as Clegane was capable of), then so be it. She should be _thanking_ him, but instead he gets stuck with _'boy'?_

_Oh, that was the fucking **limit** -_

His thumb and two fingers caught her sharp jaw and jerked her head up, not too fast, but firm enough for her to breath in sharply, chest swelling against the bag. He waited until her wide blue eyes were gazing into his grey depths, and he could see his scorched face clearly in them.

" _I_ can look you in the eye whenever I _like_ , _m'lady_."

"And yet you _don't_."

"I am right now."

"The first time in a day."

"And you know _why_."

"Yes, you made that _very_ clear."

Gods, she was so... he blood boiled and his eyes nearly flashed red at her defiance but quickly a slew of other feelings were warring with his frustration. Her closeness, the heady scent of her, thickened after two days at sea without a wash basin nearby but still like ambrosia to him. Her hair trailing over her ears, sliding out of her hood like spun flames, tickling the back of his hand. Her eyes, wide and surprised at first, then hard and _challenging_ him.

Sansa as the maiden was one thing, and one he could scarce handle at that. But her stepping up and square to him like this... that was a whole different _taste_. 

Every inch of her stood - heh, he almost smiled -  _stark_ , and he was reminded of another girl, more wolf in her than her sister, not backing down from a man three times her size. But Sandor didn't feel a shred for that Stark as he did this one and-

_Gods, why let that surface again? Are you some green boy flirting with a serving wench?_

He wasn't letting go. He planned to. Eventually. She seemed to realize his reluctance and her gaze heated along different lines. She tilted her head slightly, gaze growing shadowed, lips parting and he could see just a glimpse of her tongue behind them. Another inch, _less_ than that, if he dared, and his thumb could caress her bottom lip, plump and perfect and-

"Well," she said, voice a whisper, soaked in a tone he'd never heard from her. At least not in waking hours. "Are you going to _do_ something or not?" 

Sandor face tensed and one corner of her lips quirked, not quite a sneer, but enough of a smirk to know her lance had struck. Heat flew to his face, making his ruined side throb angrily but it was with a fresh type of wrath. The kind that brought his hand to her hip sharply, squeezing enough to make her gasp, and not entirely with pain.

"Don't play-"

"I meant the sack," she said. "Of course."

"You know _just_ -"

"Um... I, ah... I don't mean to... interrupt any-"

Both of them snapped their heads to poor Niall and the boy looked down, mayhap for a convenient hole. Wonderful. Now they were both glaring...

"It's... I mean, the night won't, ah... last forever, and I was... ahem... I was told to get you there be... before dawn, so-"

Sandor turned his gaze back to her and she -  _she_ -shook her chin from his grip and wriggled her arms into the sack. He lifted her up and part of him was grateful for the thick burlap between them. Though that did nothing to hide the warmth... gods, he could even feel it through the _plate_.

"Get comfortable," he said quietly, already burrowing into the mound of potatoes and feeling like a bloody idiot in the doing. "Or not. Just keep your face over here."

 

++++++++++

 

She didn't understand what he meant by that until he'd finished doing his impression of an oversized mole. The sack covered her completely but she'd left a small opening in the top, large enough for her to see out of... and he'd made sure that said opening was conveniently near the pile of potatoes he was hiding under.

She could see his grey eyes by their glitter. Stray shards of moonlight touched the liquid quality in them and they shone, staring right at her without a hint of anything else, like disembodied grumpkin eyes following her in the forest. Once she would have felt goosebumps pimple her skin and screamed at such a sight; now it kept her breath steady and her heart from bursting out her mouth.

_Sullen, coarse, crude, impossible, **stupid** man... but you feel safe with him. Safer than anywhere else in the world._

The cart lurched as Niall shook the reins and the ponies began their leisurely trot back to White Harbor. Stranger huffed indignantly and did the same, tied to the back of the cart and _very_ unimpressed that he was being dragged around like a common courser. Sansa wanted to smile, but didn't dare. As if her lips would creak loud like a floorboard in a deserted house, bringing down all of the harbor upon them. So she focused on those eyes.

Steady. Sharp. Barely blinking as the smooth-if-squelchy path of mud and dirt changed into cobbles... and then they started to shake in earnest.

Potatoes tumbled from the main pile and thumped down on her. Sansa bit down on her tongue as one - no, three - smacked her on the shoulder and then the head, curling herself tighter into a ball-

"Careful, m'lady," the hiss was low as a snake's. "Try and stay straight. Curl up like that and you'll _look_ like a girl in a sack." 

She nodded her head and felt fear shiver through her, and the familiar shame that followed it. Not just fear for her life; fear of failure. Fear of being caught, of being discovered, of letting down those who'd died for her, who'd been strong and brave and risked much to help her. The more she thought the more it seemed like the weight of a mountain bearing down on her, crushing her into the cart-

"You're doing fine, Sansa."

Her eyes opened and she saw grey eyes. Crinkled at the corners, as if he were smiling.

"'mornin' t'yeh, Niall, how... bloody hells, lad, where'd y'get that big sod?!"

Fresh voices. Casual greetings tossed between Niall and two others, obviously the kind exchanged nearly every night. Sansa listened carefully... heard the sound of a spear handle tapping the ground, probably as a man walked. Leather boots creaking on the cobbles. She knew the tone, as well. The officious-but-lowborn, and thus clinging to every scrap of what authority they had.  

 _Watchmen_ , she mouthed. She didn't even know if he could see her lips, but the eyes moved... nodded. 

"Picked 'im up from a cog outta Saltpans, just up the river. They docked at Stefan's pier."

"Oh, aye," one said, suspicion soaking his voice, "Just to deliver an 'orse?"

Sansa could imagine the apathetic shrug and the grimace that came with it, and then-

Niall yawned, long and loud, and the girl thought, _good show!_

"I dunno, mate. All I know is 'is lordship wanted the nag delivered to the Castle, and I got tossed some coin to bring 'im over with the taters."

"What ship was this?"

"Oh, I dunno... Silver something. Fin, maybe. No! Stork. Stork? Coulda' been gull... but they'll be in port tomorrow, lads I spoke to said so."

Sansa felt herself smile, almost in wonder... then made a note to herself to be wary around poor, bumbling Niall (now perhaps worth of quotation marks). The boy lied smooth as molten silver, and she could feel the tension ease out of one voice-

-but not the other.

"S'all you got in 'ere?" A voice loomed over her from the side, followed by a shadow. A fuzzy silhouette of a man in a helmet, shortspear in hand. "Gods, smell bloody awful."

"Bloody telling me! I gotta haul the sods! But a stag's a stag, I always say."

She couldn't see it, but she could feel Sandor moving. Probably a hand to his sword hilt, just in case he had to-

That was enough. The mound was not a hill or a mountain, packed and solid and without air. It was a delicate construction, a thousand objects all slightly different from each other, piled atop one another in no order even a maester could fathom. When he moved too much, the order was disturbed and a minor landslide tumbled from the edge.

Sansa's breath caught in her throat. She could see his boot!

Sandor's eyes flashed, and a hardness settled over them, like a knight setting down the visor of his helm. He was going to kill them. She knew it as sure as she knew her name. As soon as the words "that a boot?" came from the man's lips, that mound would explode into a huge mass of killing muscle with four feet of sharp steel attached to it, and these nameless, blameless watchmen would die-

"Oh, _there_ it is!"

Then she gaped as Niall reached back and pulled a wineskin from a peg near the mound... and just so happened to brush a fresh wave of potatoes down, and over Sandor's boot. She heard a happy guzzling sound and then, "Fancy a pull, boys?"

"Well, we _are_ on duty..."

"I'm not hearin' a 'no', Ted."

"Fine, fine, twist me arm, then!"

Sansa felt a flush on her cheeks. Her heart raced and it - no, it _rushed_. She could feel it aching and streaming through her veins and she had to grit her teeth behind her smile not to pant with excitement. So close! A casual glance from discovery and only the quick wits of a lowborn drover had saved them, and not just the "them" in the wagon. She knew Sandor, what he could do and how necessary his fell skills were _._ But try as she might, she could not imagine a world where she could brush off two lives as innocent as Ted and... whoever. 

A few happy pulls and slurred farewells later, the cart was moving again, and the hill bearing a while castle rose above them.

 

++++++++++

 

_Lad's not a complete fuckin' fool after all._

Sandor was not a man easily impressed, but when the boy made his song and dance about a wineskin and shoved those tatties back over his boot, well, that had been one of those moments. His hand relaxed on the bastard sword and he felt his spine turn to fish glue for a moment. Gods, he hoped those watchmen were enjoying their wine. A few moments later and they'd never have tasted anything again.

Wine. Sandor licked his lips. He needed it. Now. His blood had surged and howled for action again, innocent or not, and while the voice in his mind that bore her tones chided him for wishing it... gods, it had been so long. The roar and rush, scarlet spray on your face, the thrill and bloody, animal joy of triumph in the death of your opponent. What could be better? What made a man feel more like-

_Well. There is one thing._

Sandor swallowed hard and screwed his eyes shut until they were twin craters of wrinkles in his face. Wine. He needed wine _badly_. 

"That was so exciting!"

He wanted to scowl at her but was still so jitterbugged from their close call that all he could do was give a low, whispered chuckle, staring at those limpid blue pools with... 

Gods. _This_ was the problem with battle-madness. Once you were done with the fighting, or denied the fighting, you wanted the _other_ f-thing.

"We nearly got _caught_ , girl. That your idea of excitement?"

Was it his imagination, or did those blue eyes gleam with something more than just mirth for a moment? No matter. A second later she answered, tones of playful accusation even in her whisper: "Well, you're so _big_! If you were _little_ you could have moved and not disturbed the potatoes!"

He did not reply and mayhap she thought she'd won. But his eyes still blazed at her and he weighed an odd, no, _premier_ decision in his head. Would he cross that line? Had he been more of himself, mayhap not... but Sandor was aching from shoulders to tongue to the heat in his crotch and hells it was only a handful of words and she needed the reassurance-

_Yes, whatever you need tell yourself._

"I'm so _big_ , am I?"

There was no mistaking his tone. A woman would need to be a babe or _dead_ not to hear it. Sansa's amused eyes went wide as marbles and that doe-eyed shock just fed the growl that purred from him unconsciously.

" _San-_ dor! I was referring-"

"Been listening to the maids, have we?"

Another volley! Now there was a choked little sound that came from the opening of the sack and Sandor had to bite down on his lip not to chuckle. Gods forbid they get caught traveling in a fucking potato cart, but he could see her blush at that moment. The way it reddened her face from her chin to the corners of her eyes, and she got so flustered and fiddled with the hem of her dress or played with her hair. How she stumbled over her words and bit her lip when embarassment gave way to coy amusement. The way the sight of her sharp, small teeth biting down on her red lips made his breeches tighten.

The image became so real that his eyes... drifted. Unfocused. Something pulsed and pounded lower in him and only her flashing blue pulled him back.

"That... That is not-"

"Shhh, m'lady. We're meant to be quiet, yes?"

"You started it!"

" _Both_ of you _hush_ , damn it! We're still on the bloody street!"

Oh, he'd be dealing with _him_ later...

Sandor was quiet. Silent as a mouse in his hole. But his eyes never stopped smirking at the ones glaring back at him, but not with malice. Something much more promising, and by the Stranger's thorny _arsehole_ , he should have _never_ sparked it. 

 _You win_ , those eyes said, _for the moment._

The clatter of hooves and clank of wheels became louder, as if the walls were closing in, and a before long Sandor heard the drover call out to a gatekeeper. Iron screeched and scraped against iron and the shunting machinery of a portcullis ground into action, clack-clackering until it was up enough for the cart to pass through. They were in a courtyard. He could hear the familiar stamp-in-sync of patrolling feet, but the cart lurched to one side and they were in-

_Stable. Fresh hay and horseshit. No mistaking that._

"It's fine," Niall said in his normal tones, jumping down from his seat. "You can come out."

Sandor decided to keep his hand on his sword anyway, rising from the mound like a monster from a grave of vegetables, straightening up fast, looking around quick-

-taking in horses in their little enclosures peering at him with that bored expression, more interested in what the hells Stranger was-

-and then the three men at the far doorway. Two guards in blue-green wool cloaks and mail armor, carrying odd spears like they were mermen. The last man wore the livery of a house servant, and was old enough to be proud of it. He looked over the towering warrior, eyes going wide at his face. Sandor didn't even blink. What was new _there_?

"And you are?"

"My name is Guyman. Lord Wylis said we would be receiving..." He cocked an eyebrow as the potato sack next to Sandor squirmed into life. "... late guests. I take it this is the young lady?"

"Might be. How'd I know y'can be trusted?"

Guyman's face tightened at the implied insult, but like any true lord-lackey, he covered it with impeccable politeness. "Lord Reed sends his regards, does he not?"

Sandor weighed his options yet again, with a far different outcome. He still had his arms. His bastard and long and dagger and mailed fists that could crush a nose into a brain. He would not leave her side, and if need be... he could buy her time to run. So he let go the hilt of his blade and knelt down.

"Aye. He does. Out we come, m'lady..."

By the time he'd got her out of the sack, Guyman was finishing up with Niall. A little purse was pressed into his palm and the head servant actually took the pains to grasp the boy's thin shoulder, nodding sagely.

"This house will not forget your service, boy."

"And nor will I, Niall."

That stunned pretty much everyone else. Sandor could only imagine the thoughts rampaging through the boy's mind. A vision of loveliness, covered in old potatoes and hooded and still The Maiden in the flesh, batting her eyes at him and... grasping his hands that held the purse. Warm and soft, but firm in their insistence. The little ball in the boy's throat danced up and down like it trying to escape and Sando felt an unfamiliar flush of jealousy threaten to twist his face into a snarl. 

Not the actions of a lord like Howland Reed, who respected Sansa as a lady and his friend's daughter. Nor even Sandor, who protected her. Now Sandor looked on a man who had eyes on _his_ little bird and in a way that wasn't speaking of fucking poems and cunting minstrels-

_When was she **yours** , exactly?_

"You were very quick and clever, and you helped me friend here with your _wineskin_." The boy looked down and blushed, but when he looked back at her... oh, there was a _boldness_ in his eyes, the cheeky little shit! Sandor's teeth ground hard until one of the guards frowned at him, wondering where that bloody sound was coming from. Sandor straightened his face quickly. "You cannot know who I am, but... I will ever be grateful."

_Don't get too bloody pally, boy..._

"The pleasure was mine... m'lady."

"Time to go."

Sandor didn't mean to snap. He really didn't. He also didn't mean to glare at the boy one last time before they left the stables. He meant to tell him - in his usual, eloquent and charming manner - that he'd a cunning mind and should try and apply it, not waste his time hauling around veggies _._  

But then he'd seen that last, lingering glance the boy trailed up Sansa as she turned from him, from her thighs up her arse to her swan-tapered neck, and all Sandor could do was clench his fists until the knuckles whitened and hold himself back from doing something unpleasant. 

"Farewell, s... er... stranger," the boy said to Sandor's back. 

"Aye. Mind yer way, lad," Sandor threw a look over his shoulder, and made sure it was the charred wasteland of his left that the boy saw. "And yer _eyes_."

It was worth it just to see the boy pale, just before Guyman and the guard led the two of them onward through the ill-lit hallway, past faded tapestries and relics shrunken with age, towards the current lord of New Castle.

 

++++++++++

 

Like most Manderlys, Wylis was blessed with a stomach that could have shamed a giant. Also like the rest of his house, when he _wanted_ to move swiftly, by the gods, _he did_.

Guyman was trailing him by some feet as his sealskin pounds slapped the stone floors, winding his way towards the scarce-used study in one of the castles towers. A few times the skinnier man had to jog to keep up, huffing a little while Wylis' breathing didn't seem to skip or grow heavy.

No. Part of him, most of him, the parts Gregor Clegane had tried to sever from his soul... they _relished_ this.

His mind buzzed with what his father had told him after his feast, when he'd made a great show of taking his son back to his chambers and "settle him in properly with the family he's missed so dearly". That Lord Wyman had done, but more besides. Words flowed from the fat man who everyone thought was _just_ fat, and Wylis' world changed, broadened, enlightened and darkened all in the space of the telling. 

The grotesque betrayal of the Young Wolf at the Twins by their allies, Frey and Bolton, claiming not only their King but their beloved brother and son. Wyman's plans to revenge himself in any way on the traitors, even if it meant bending the knee to the Lannisters and that pale, empty creature Roose. His slow build up of the Manderly navy and their heavy horse, preparing for an eventual reckoning with the Warden of The North... and more besides.

Stannis on the Wall. The new faction in the North who'd barely ever even been there in his entire life, who was now dependent on success there since his power in the South had dwindled, stronghold by stronghold...

Rickon Stark. Alive and well. Gods, he still remembered his father's eyes when he spoke the words. Tears shone in them, as they would shine in all true Northmen. The scion of House Stark, Old Ned's boy, his true heir, not dead at a traitor's hand but alive and roaming like the wolves of his sigil. Wyman brought Wylis back into his confidence without question, telling him how Davos was being sent to find the boy in Skagos, bring him back to White Harbor, a living banner for all the North to rally behind.

Wylis had to ask for pause just to take it all in. So much information his head hut, so many fresh angles and players, as if the game of thrones had become a dozen boards with hundreds of pieces. But when his father had caught his gaze again, there was a question there he dared not refuse.

"I did not suffer The Mountain to waste and hide in this castle," he'd said when his father asked, voice low but soaked with months of churning hatred. "I did not mourn our King, our _true_ King, and our brother who died defending him, to spend my days a mind-addled cripple afraid of every shadow. I am your son. Your heir. A son of the North and a loyal servant to House Stark. Where I can aid, I will. Command me, father, and see it done."

Lord Wyman's eyes had glowed and his lips pursed. Wylis had never seen the man more proud... and then he gave him the most startling news of all.

Now she was there, if Howland Reed was not mistaken. _Was that likely_ , Wylis wondered, spying the two guards flanking the study door. _Damnit! Should have bade them wait inside. Too obvious, prying eyes and all..._

Sansa Stark. The last remaining Stark child, after Rickon, and this one not lost on some cannibal island but _there_ , on the shores of The Bite, close enough, within their grasp-

_Caution... Caution..._

Wylis reined himself as his hand reached for the door. A hundred voices and plots, from mundane to extravagant, all jostled for attention and he closed his eyes... breathed steady... became himself again. That was the problem with the damned game that the southrons played, and now Roose seemed to love so much. It made a man forget it was _people_ he was playing with, not cyvasse pieces. Wylis was hardly a maiden to the act of spending lives, as both liege and commander, but... these were Ned's children. The Ned all the North loved, and would never forget nor forgive his killers. Nor those of his son. Or his brother.

_Or mine. You can make your house proud and take your own sweet vengeance, and do right by the North and the Starks. All is possible, if you keep your eyes open and your mind clear._

He smoothed down his great drooping moustache that flowed down his cheeks to his chin and took a deep, fortifying breath. He was hardly dressed to entertain but such affairs were not done in the light of day. The two guards nodded their greeting to him and he nodded back. They were loyal men, every one in this castle. All with family stretching back generations, centuries in service to the Manderlys. _Knowing whom to trust_ , his father had told him, _is as important as having trust. Especially when coin and opportunity can so often sway a man._

Wylis Manderly opened the door and beheld his guests. 

 

++++++++++

 

There was bread and cheese and cold meats on the table and Sansa completely forgot she was a lady. She ignored Sandor's bloody amused expression as she tore into what was on the plate, gnawing ravenously at a hunk of cheese and shoving in a morsel of bread before it was even chewed, then some greasy pork and-

"Less than a night with the Manderlys and already eating like one?"

She should have known better than to try one of Sandor's "looks". She didn't have the face for it and he always laughed anyway. But she wanted to see him laugh, even if she was... wait, _was_ she still angry at him? She must have been. Her chewing slowed and she peered at him from beneath her lashes. The smile still alighted his face as he carefully ground his own plate down to nothing, like some great war horse demolishing a bag of oats, fuel for its furnace. 

_He'd japed with her. Under a mound of potatoes in a city they did not know, he'd made... **bawdy** humor with her._

She couldn't help the giggle and his relentless chewing stopped. 

"What's funny?"

Sansa shook her head and looked at him. Full in the face. 

"You are."

"Huh. Can't say I've been called that before."

"Few know you as well as I do."

"True enough, m'lady."

She winced. Gods, that still stung. But she would need to get used to it. Sandor wasn't one to change his mind, and he was set upon his course. If he wanted to-

 _No. It does not have to be that way. I can show him._  

She chewed more thoughtfully now. Sipped her water carefully, and her brief stares to him were heated not just in that nameless longing she'd felt for him, a girlish thing grown to womanhood, but also something more calculating. He wanted to keep her safe from himself, and himself safe from her. She could understand that. The houses and their rules, their traditions, she understood them, too.

Just as she knew understood that anything is possible in times of great chaos. Sansa did not know exactly what she intended to do, but she knew any future she had would be in the cold North, not the warm South, with its lush leagues and deceptive prosperity. She wanted her home; she wanted Winterfell. But gods, to _gain_ them? Greater and more cunning minds than her had tried and been butchered. Her brother, who never lost a battle, but lost a whole war at a wedding. Her father, who'd been second only to the King and still lost his head like a common deserter. Baelish and his black heart that lied to everyone like fish drank water. Varys, endlessly scuttling and spinning webs across realms and oceans. She was just... Sansa. Silly Sansa with her silly dreams and-

 _And him._  

"I think that drover lad was giving you the eye. And don't pretend you don't know what _that_ means."

Nothing would make Sansa's thoughts flit from grand strategy to a girl of six-and-ten again than words like that. She blushed a little in the candlelight and Sandor smiled knowingly. 

"He was... probably just grateful. For my thanks-"

Her champion sighed. When she cast a frown his way, he could see him shaking her head, and the smile on his face was mocking but soft. The shadows hugged his face on the burned side and she could barely see them. More glimpses at what could have been. Not just in flesh, but the comfort in his eyes. 

_This could be our chambers, in another world._

"M'lady, you don't see your own beauty, do you?" Her throat tightened and her heart coughed in her chest. "Well, others do. Boys like that always-"

"And you?"

She knew he would tighten up; throw up his walls like Unsullied with their shields, lockstep and implacable. But she'd since grown accustomed to this tactic. She had plenty of her own to work with. He fiddled with a crust of bread and looked away as he answered.

"A man would be blind not to."

"And you care not for them looking?"

"I do not," he said in a lie so base even she could smell it. "I mind if they match _hands_ with those eyes. Then they and I will have business." He tapped his sword hilt to show just what kind of business he meant, but Sansa felt no thrill of fear at the gesture. Instead she smiled, and that seemed to make him all the more stoic. "Just... be watchful, is all I ask. Beauty is talked about, so you'd best hide it. I'd wager few in White Harbor-"

"Could match mine?"

Sandor's mouth hung loose as she snatched the words from his tongue, and there was no point backtracking. She grinned wider as she saw his brain putter and stammer, trying to think of an appropriately subservient response, hoping that he would-

"Fucking bad habit you have, m'lady. Stealing others' words."

Sansa smirked that same way she did when she goaded him in the cart, slicing a hunk of cheese from the block and popping it into her mouth, making sure he watched every movement, from the glide of her fingers to the slow swirl of her lips.

"I'll bear that in mind..."

Then the door opened and a fat man in evening wear entered. At once he looked her over and she could see his mind whirring, trying to cast back and back, some memory or time...

"I... Do you know me, child?"

Sansa rose and studied the man. His great ruddy cheeks were not the pink apple of King Robert, but hung like his brush-like moustache, as if the skin were missing muscle. His eyes were sunken, not by age but by hardship, and gods knew she'd learned to spot the difference. His hair was thinned and his form was as she expected from a Lord in House Manderly: broad, wide and unashamed of it. But his face... only echoes, she found... except-

"I saw you," she said slowly, as if from the depths of a dream. "A year before I left. You came to Winterfell, with... another man. Older. Your father." He nodded, but cautiously. "That night you roared so much with mead and wine I thought you were a bear. Robb even called you-"

"-Salt Bear of the White Harbor."

They spoke together and Wylis' jaw dropped. He shook his head and then turned to the seven-pointed carving above the fireplace. "Bless you, bless you, seven times seven times for you all... Ned's girl has come home to us..."

At the mention of her father Sansa felt tears spring to her eyes, but they came with a snort of laughter. A Northman who would not betray her, who loved her father and served her brother. Who _remembered her_. Then he turned to Sandor, stunned smile still fresh on his face.

"And this is your protector, I gather? Come, man. Stand and let me..."

Sandor did as he was bid, and turned... and Wylis' good humor shattered into pieces.

 

++++++++++

 

 _Gods, she even makes eating cheese look like something that would give a septon a stiff one._  

Sandor had to swallow down hard and reinforce his dry mouth with a gulp of wine before he could tear his eyes away from her. _She's a young girl, and you are not_ , he reminded himself frantically, not daring to look over to her again. _She's been through much and needs someone... well, I don't fucking know, but it's not going to be you. And stop playing with her like you have been!_

He wanted to heed the words and opened his mouth to do just the opposite when the door opened and a walrus in clothing entered, looking flustered. Clegane sat in watchful silence as he and the little bird exchanged words, some test it seemed, proving whom she was. Sandor bent his head so they would not see his relieved smile when the lord was won over.

 _She's gone too long living name to name, lie to lie. She needs to be who she is; who she was born to be._  

Then his own name was called and Sandor braced himself for the usual. He fixed a bored expression on his face when Wylis' own froze into a mask of horror. But then it didn't end. He wasn't just disgusted with Sandor's face; he was _studying_ it. Remembering it. The man known once as The Hound frowned as he found himself doing the same, one remaining eyebrow scrunched hard onto his eyes as he thought back...

"I recall your face, my lord," he said, keeping it as civil as Sansa would want. The fat lord's lips kept going like a fucking fish, though. "I was at King's-"

"Sandor... _Clegane_...?"

That last word came out like poison being spat into a fire. The family name, not his own. Ah. He could guess the reason at that, and nodded cautiously. 

"Aye, yer lordship. House Clegane-"

"Brother to The... M..." The man looked ready to vomit and had to steady himself on the mantle above the hearth. Sansa seemed about to steady him but he put up a warning hand, never taking eyes like bore drills off Sandor. "... The Mountain?"

That was all it took for all civility to flee from Sandor. Once again he was The Hound, defined and driven solely by blasphemous hatred. "Aye, and you'll be wise not to mention-"

"Guards!" Wylis all-but-shrieked, insane fury bubbling up from his eyes along with his voice. He grabbed Sansa's arm and pulled her away from him like he truly was a rabid dog fit to bite. "Guards! Get in here! Child, get away from-"

"Get your _fucking hand off her!_ "

The door exploded with blue-green cloaks and tridents and Sandor's bastard and dagger were out and swinging and Sansa screamed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yay for a new POW! Phew! Amazing what a night of insomnia, a gallon of Earl Grey, a head full of ideas and a six-hour Mozart video on YouTube can help you accomplish. Oh, I also tried this crazy thing called "editing" with this one. Lemme know if you can see a difference... and enjoy! Don't think I'll be knockin' out another one this size for a while.
> 
> Yet another perfect Sandor song, peeps. Feel free to craft something literary around it. I know I might! Warning: the video WILL leave you in tears.  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_l4Ab5FRwM


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Y'know, I have so many things planned and I forget half of them. Including chapter notes.
> 
> Oh, one thing: the Future/Present part of the story will take a backseat for a little while, in case anyone was wondering about the structure change. Not that I don't have plenty more left for it, but the flashbacks are, really, MUCH more interesting and FAR longer, so I don't wanna get one finished way before the other. Don't worry, though! We'll still be checking in on The Running Man and The Left Lady, hehe!

Sandor heard her scream but it by that point, it mattered not. Decades of training, conditioning and more wet, panting brushes with The Stranger that even he could remember flushed frothing into his veins when he saw the door burst open. His hands were filled with steel before the guards could even lower their tridents. The world both slowed and sped in that pregnant moment before weapons met, his mind swallowing whole what his eyes beheld. 

What they carried. How they carried them. Their eyes and postures. Numbers. Position. Surroundings. Everything a calculation his mind made without him ever thinking.

Tywin Lannister was a meticulous man. When he set to make the Clegane brothers killers, he saw it through. 

Now one of them stood with a snarl of rage ripping his face nearly in two, hands stayed only by the fact his little bird was too close to them all. If he went in swinging now, as he dearly longed to, she could get struck, and in the ruthless melee of close quarters, who was to say it it would be mortal or not? Wylis' eyes were fat wells of incontinent rage; Sandor knew well the look. Gregor had cleaved deep into the man. Made him crawl and beg and stripped away his soul because, well, _why not?_  Now he had another Clegane under _his_ roof, under _his_ power. 

Sandor knew a broken man when he saw it. Now that man held his little bird and life devolved to a simple choice.

Kill or die.

"Let her go, you fat idiot-"

"Disarm him and take him to-"

"My Lord, stop this, he-"

"Puddit down bastard, or we'll-!"

" _Fuck yourselves_ , y'merman cunts! Stand aside and hand her-"

"You kidnapped her, didn't you? Your _brother_ sent you-"

"Sandor, please, don't-"

"Mention that fucking _cunt_ against I will choke you on your _cock_ -"

"Bring him _down_ , damn you both-"

"You think two  _gnats_  will stop me from cutting you in half?!"

"More will come!"

"More will  _die!_ "

The world filled with noise. Screams and threats and tears and boasts and all of it was a thunder in his ears that made no sense, brooked no options or escapes. His hands tightened on his weapons and there was a flash of silver in Wylis' hand-

_A dagger?! The fuck did he get-_

The fat lord raised it. It could have been for Sansa's throat. It could have been to point at Sandor. 

He wouldn't wait to-

 

++++++++++

 

Sansa's dream burned to a nightmare so fast she was still choking on her joyful tears when Wylis grabbed her. In a blink she was at his side, held roughly by hands stronger than his grossness implied, terror in his eyes and well-earned hatred. He called for his guards and they came and Sansa screamed "no!" and it made no difference.

The Hound wasn't dead. He never died. He simply wasn't needed anymore. But now, as far as Sandor saw, he was.

She could have wept at how quickly, and how easily, he became that man again. 

Then all was raised voices and she could see the fear in the eyes of the guardsmen. Sandor towered over them, still stamped with his armor, blades that he knew intimately in both hands. She noticed he favored one leg over another now, but aside from that, his form was solid. They were good men, she was sure of that. They loved their lord and lady and protected them. But that would not save them from Sandor, a man bred to end lives. 

"You think two _gnats_ will stop me from cutting you down?!"

"More will come!"

"More will _die!_ "

Sansa gasped and her heart clenched like a hand was squeezing it. She knew he was right. She could see the bloody road ahead of them, however short it would be. Sandor would kill them. Then Wylis. Then whoever was outside. Then he would hack and cleave through man after man until they were free... but it would not end so. Could he slaughter a whole garrison of guards? Men who were trusted and trained to guard the house nobility? Or the watchmen that would come after? And after _that_ , all in White Harbor who would revile their names and hunt them down?

_He cannot win a war by himself. You'll watch him die._

The dagger glinted and Sansa saw the embers of madness in Wylis' eyes. Some wound there that howled at him in the dark of night, and Sandor had dragged it to the light. She saw Sandor tense and his pupils shrink to dots, teeth exposed, canines sharp and body tired of _waiting_ -

_Gods protect me. Just this once-_

Sansa moved.

 

++++++++++

 

_MountainCleganeMountainCleganeMountainCleganeMountainfatlittleiggytastegooddoesntitlikemorefreshfreshfresh-_

The mad litany that taunted Wylis Manderly was deafening and he could not blot it out. The sight of The Hound's half-wasted features killed the smile on his lips and drowned the hope and the gratitude to the Seven. The present vanished; suddenly the past had found him again. One who shared the blood of The Mountain, who was dead and rotting and Wylis still dreamed him battering down his walls every night, to take his wife and daughters and drag them all back to Harrenhal and he would _not have that happen_ , not with another Clegane-

The girls screamed. Gods, what had he _done_ to her? Wait... was she a part of it?

Whispers became screeches, accusing, traitor, liar, _usurper_ -

The dagger he bought from his room came up and he made to pulled the girl behind him. Whatever her role, she _was_ just a girl, and until he knew better-

-then something hard and bony rammed him in the gut and the air flew from him in a rush-

-thin wrist snatched out of his grasp as The Hound's sword rose and cast the Stranger's shadow over all-

"STOP THIS!"

The bloody babbling stalled. The four men - frightened, growling and doubled over panting - stood agape at the girl who threw herself between them, arms spread wide, hood knocked down and blood-red hair cascading from her shoulders. Tears glistened on her cheeks but her jaw was tight, breath coming out fast but steady.

Wylis growled and looked at her, face contorted in fury.

"You... fucking _whore_ -"

 

++++++++++

 

_That's it. He dies. After a fashion._

Sandor surged forward but she did not move. In fact she shifted to her side and blocked him again. The work of a sweeping arm would have knocked her from his path but her hand grabbed the mantle and her eyes flashed to him and-

He saw the plea in them. Desperate and wild and without anything to back it up. The silent plea for him to just _wait_ , for him to just _listen_.

Wylis spat his curse again and she turned to him, auburn inferno around her head matching the fire of her words.

"He _saved me_ , Lord Wylis! From a man who would have used me to swell his own power! He risked much and _lost_ much to do so, and rather than sell me to the Lannisters or the Boltons or anyone with designs on the North, he brought me _here!_ "

"No... No." Fat fucking fool was too far gone. Sandor's toes curled in his boots, knees bent to jump. This would solve nothing. The guards first. Knock their spears up and away, finish them quick with the dagger. Then carve fatty open with his bastard and grab her, keep her at his back as he got to the gate. "You lie! You're no _Stark_! You're just-"

Sandor saw it from the back. He wondered what it looked like from the front. Then again, he saw their faces, over her shoulder...

Her shoulders squared and her chin rose. Her back was straight as a rod of iron and a cold, indignant fury that was built on a hundred generations of Northern granite shone from her. Her words seemed more like slabs of iron than the whitterings of a clueless girl. She spoke them as if channeling the words of the god and damnation would befall all who questioned her.

"I am Lady Sansa Stark, ser! Firstborn daughter of Lord Eddard Stark, Lord of Winterfell and Hand of The King! The _last_ trueborn Stark child to walk this world and the _only_ one that saw Ilyn Pyane take his _fucking head_ when he was promised _mercy_!" The guards quailed suddenly as if struck by freezing water. Was it the language? Sandor would have thought so. He was raised thinking highborn ladies simply weren't capable of cursing. "I saw you at that feast years ago. You called my brother a 'bold pup' and you teased Theon by making him think you could pull endless stags from his ears. You clasped my father's hand like he was your own and _your own_ clasped _him_ as a _brother_."

Sandor could see the fat lord's eyes glaze over in memory. Wet and shining. The dagger wavered. The Hound fell back, reluctant and snarling, and Sandor's hateful glare began to soften in shock.

He could feel life and the future creep back into the room.

"I... remember."

" _This man_ ensured I could return. He was the Lannister's dog, and he fled them. He was Joffrey's killer, and he deserted him. He swore his shield and his life to _me_ , under he eyes of the weirwood at Greywater Watch. You know him as Gregor Clegane's brother? You bear the scars of that beast? Then look-!"

She whirled and Sandor felt... oddly exposed, all things considered. His glare still smoldered but his weapons were slowly lowering, giving them clear sight to the puckered, cratered flesh, the scorched tendons and the ivory gleam of bone, even the hint of the black and flat hole his ear had become. All of this his little bird pointed to, tears running freely now.

Sandor stared at her, mouth slowly opening as he read the grief hiding behind her outrage. 

For _him_. 

"Lay eyes on more of it! See what The Mountain did to his _own brother_ , when he was but a child!"

 

++++++++++

 

Her elbow would sting like damnation for a while. But she barely felt it.

She despaired even as she spoke. He would never trust her again.

Gods, it was _not_ something he wanted known. A war wound, an accident, even a drunken fall... anything better than the shame of the world knowing his own blood had scarred him, and the pity he despised so much that would come with it. But Sansa had run out of options; only the worst were open to her and Lord Wylis was still teetering between peace and... well, not _war_. Slaughter, probably.

Now he beheld Clegane with fresh eyes, shaking head now more twitching.

"I... Your brother?" He addressed the hulking man directly. She thought that was an improvement, at least. "He did this?"

Sandor glared and bit back the acid on his tongue. He wanted to spit and snarl and rage at the man, this fool who took him for... 

Then he sighed. She saw him as something else. But she was not the world. His eyes never left Wylis; his voice was so low one had to strain to hear it.

"I was seven," he said, voice a dull monotone, bereft of pain. He'd endured so much that it no longer mattered. Now he didn't even have Gregor's life to take and repay him. "I was playing with his toys. He held my face to a burning brazier until I smelled it for weeks after they'd taken the dressings off. I still do. Every night." 

Sansa let out a shuddering, staggering breath that seemed to take the life from her legs. She sagged a little against the mantle, arm out to block Sandor now the only thing keeping her upright. Her breathing was steady and her heart matched it. She could not fall. The air was still rank with tension, but she was putting the gears in motion. She could feel it, like the stirrings of an avalanche, but now away from them, not dooming them all.

"I-I had no idea."

"No-one does," Sandor spoke again and Sansa winced at the snarl in his voice. She knew he could not help it, by Wylis' guards tensed again. "Apart from... fuck, I don't know anymore." His blades lowered even further and in a breath his shoulders slumped. "Not something a man wants spoken by strangers, is it?"

Wylis was staring at him, jowls still trembling, but not with rage now. From memory. He opened his mouth and... something stalled. Little pig eyes that were so quick, so glowing with pride and affability when she was a child. She remembered them. He wasn't the chiseled night of her stories, but even as a girl she knew a good man when she saw it.

Why is it only the good men who are broken? Why do the monsters fit so well with this horror?

"Men... stand to your posts," he said quietly. The guards exchanged looks again and stared at their lord with wary warning. He stared back and nodded, recovering himself with a flex of his shoulders. "I... ahem... I am sure. You may go."

"As m'lord commands..."

They didn't even bother shooting a black glare at Sandor as they left. They were looking at his weapons, not him. Sansa was almost impressed. Then the lord turned to her, still separated from them by the gulf of the room, the chaos the upturned table had made on the floor. Their good meal of cheese and bread and meats was stamped and crumbled, spilled wine leaking into the cracks under the carpet. Wylis turned to her slowly and a slow, pained smile crossed his lips.

"Look away, Lady Stark."

"Wh-What?"

He nodded to Sandor, frowning again so deep she could barely see his eyes. But at least his blades were sheathed again and he was not on the cusp of murder.

"One day I will ask forgiveness for the foul words I spoke to you. But first, I have something to show him. You have my word, nothing untoward."

Sansa just blinked and tried to understand, but found she couldn't. Something to show? What could he be carrying? He was dressed in next to nothing and-

Some quiet realization made her thoughts stop into silence. She looked between them, two men so very different, in temper and body and attitude, in sins and virtues, station and birth... but bound in one horrible thing. Sansa turned away from the air before the fire place... but let her hand fall into Sandor's own as she did. He squeezed it, and she closed her eyes.

 

++++++++++

 

Sandor didn't feel better for the telling. Not to some fat bastard who'd been ready to knife him seconds before, and not to a couple of no-nothing cunts in stupid fucking cloaks and aborted spears. That was his past, his business, and the world had no right to peer into it. Only he had the right...

But her eyes had begged him, and Sandor could see her strategy. She was not a warrior of steel and muscle, but guile and words. She understood people, or thought she did, and well enough to make them do as she wanted. Usually Sandor would have scorned her like as cowards; but now he saw it was because all those he had met with that cunning gift and cunt-tongue did so to gain power, or gold, or both, and threw lives away like bread to ducks. 

Not Sansa. Not his little bird. That was why he spoke. 

The guards left. Sandor's blades returned to their sheaths but his hands stayed balled into fists, metal finger gloves grinding at each other as he waited. Mayhap no man had to die that night. But he would wait until His Fucking Lordship were gone before he slept and rested even close to easy. Then Wylis made his request and Sandor frowned, as uncomprehending as her.

But she turned from the two, and he felt the pressure of her hand. His teeth mashed a moment and he resisted the urge to shut his eyes, shut the room from him and lose himself in her. He wanted to rip off his glove and have her flesh on his flesh. She was so brave, standing between them all, on the very birth of painting the room with scarlet and entrails. He glanced at her, but her eyes were closed.

Metal clinked on stone. Wylis placed the dagger on the mantle. When it came back to him, he pulled the collar of his nightshirt down, revealing his pale and bloated chest, or at least the top of it-

-and the strip of angry red tissue there that would never heal. It would from his shoulder, across his chest... and whatever nipple he'd had on his right was gone forever, carved off with that parchment-thin portion of flesh and fat. 

"Part of his games," he said, in the tone of one survivor to another. "At Harrenhal."

Sansa saw Sandor's eyes flicker away. To the fire. To memories he hated to have and hated more for making him what he was. He nodded.

"Aye. That would be Gregor's fucking sport..."

"I-" Wylis' words stalled and Sandor didn't look at him. He knew that look; Wylis might have hated it as much as he did. So he waited for the lord to find his voice. "I should not have cast you as your brother. That was unworthy."

Sandor looked at him now. The pits and valleys of his burned face casting deep shadows, unnatural and inhuman. The scarring around his eye stark and making it seem an unblinking, counterfeit orb. His lips scarred and twisted forever on one side. A monster. But the eyes themselves were not. They were knowing. They knew that was as close as Wylis would get to an apology.

His own was a grunt of acceptance and a short nod. Then he squeezed Sansa's hand again and her eyes fluttered open. 

Her blue eyes seemed to end it all. The anger and the misunderstanding, dead memories and rage that couldn't revenge, couldn't get even, could do nothing but eat away at you until all that was left was-

_Enough. Enough, your piteous craven._

"Well," Wylis said airily, in the unmistakable tones of a man who has erred and deeply wishes everyone to just forget about it. He pulled his nightshirt back around himself and walked to the door. "I will have some more food sent. Seems we... made a little bit of a mess."

Sandor watched him stick his head outside, but not leave. They had but a moment and he looked down at Sansa's lovely face, her eyes like mountain lakes. He so wanted to run his fingers across her pale cheeks and the sharp contours within them. To let her know how proud he was of her But he settled for a brush of his brash, brutish mailed hand against her hair and a mailed finger tipping her head up. Sandor was the one who let his eyes _shine_ now, not just _blaze_ with the lusts and hates of a man in love with battle.

"Nobly done, little bird," he rumbled, lopsided smirk growing to a smile as her lips curved like a beautiful bow. "Woulda' preferred something less _wordsome_ , but-"

She swatted his chest lightly with her free hand, biting her lip before Wylis rejoined them.

"I'm sure there will be other times."

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sandor Soundtrack of the day:  
> www.youtube.com/watch?v=7qrRzNidzIc
> 
> I feed upon comments, suggestions and critiques! Seriously, they're like a food group to me now...


	11. Chapter 11

Sansa knew Wylis was giving the short telling of events, but even still, she felt her mind fit to burst as they talked over fresh plates. She was aware she asked questions, but instead of clarity, all they prompted were fresh thickets of queries. Four years she had been gone from the North, and it had changed so much without her. She ate and tasted nothing; drank and felt no heady intoxication from the wine. She devoured words with eagerness, though, blue eyes wide and afraid to blink, as if to break her gaze with Lord Wylis would dispel all she had been told. 

None more rattling to her soul than the fact she had been wrong: she was _not_ the last trueborn Stark. 

"Rickon?" She said, voice hushed and disbelieving. "He did not perish at Winterfell?"

"Not according to my father's sources. They found the squire of the turncloak Theon after the burning. He told us, after a fashion, that your brothers-"

"Wait, _Brandon_ as well?"

Wylis smiled and patted her hand. "Yes, Lady Stark. He too lives, when last Pyke saw him. The boy is mute but not an imbecile. He followed Rickon and his nurse and that great direwolf of his as far as the coast." Then his bright smile faltered. He gripped rather than patted, as if to steady her, and Sansa felt her chest tense as if for a blow. "He told us that they... my lady, they took a boat to Skagos."

Sandor's relentless chewing - his sole contribution to the conversation thus far - ceased immediately. Sansa gasped and covered her mouth. Skagos. The isle so wild the Starks tamed it only with the loss of a small army and the death of their current lord, peopled by wildlings that _other wildlings_ told gruesome campfire stories of. Cannibals. Reavers. Savages. Even their noble houses, tasked to control them, struggled in the task.

_And **that** is where Osha took him? By the gods, if I lay eyes on her again-_

Sansa shook the thought away, hair sighing softly around her ears. No. She did not want anger to cloud her thoughts. Baelish taught her well, craven snake that he was, and she had learned well not to cast aside a lesson solely because of the teacher. She sipped deeply from her wine, aware that Sandor's eyes were on her.

There was foreboding in those grey eyes now. She could not place it, but before she could make voice, he went back to his salted pork and bread.

"Lady Stark," Wylis continued, squeezing her hand again until Sandor shot him a foul gaze he did not see and Sansa's own returned to his urgent features. "My father has sent a man to find them. A smuggler, in the service of Stannis-"

"Stannis?"

Now Sandor spoke, scraping steel voice a jarring contrast to the soft, lordly tones that the highborns spoke in. His lips curled in distaste. 

"And you trust the man?"

"My father saved his life." Wylis said, voice hardening. "He was due to die on the block and an imposter took his place, mutilated to fool the Boltons and Lannisters. In return, he would use his criminal ways to sail unnoticed to the island and bring your brother home." His smile was back, a smile that seemed to bleed hope, something Sansa had not dared feel for so long and, as she was discovering, so had many of her people. "The heir to Winterfell, Lady Stark. When word spreads that he lives and your line has not ended, the North will rally behind the Starks once again."

"Behind a _boy_?" Sandor grunted. "Don't reckon Lord Bolton and Cersei will take kindly to _that_. Nor Stannis, and _that_ dour cunt is _here_."

Sansa saw Wylis' polite mask slip and his look could have drenched Sandor with venom. The two of them were cordial, in their way, but she could see it was parchment-thin. She slid her hand from Wylis' own and touched Sandor's armored forearm.

"Sandor? Let him speak."

"M'lady, this is bloody _stupid_ ," Sandor said, and Sansa cocked her head to the side when he saw more than frustration burning in his eyes. "A boy from the island of sodding cannibals? Who may not even _remember_ who he is? The houses of the North are meant to rally behind him?"

"He _is_ trueborn son of Ned Stark, is he not?" Wylis spoke with an air of wearied exasperation, rubbing his brow and talking as if educating an ignorant child. Sandor showed him a little more teeth as a response. "That may carry no weight south of the Neck, but _here_ , that can make all the difference."

"How?"

"Because the Boltons rule solely through _fear_ and those that follow Stannis do so out of _hatred_ for them. Since the Red Wed-my lady, I am sorry-"

"Go ahead, Lord Wylis."

"Since the Red Wedding, all the North has known the stories peddled by the Freys - of men transforming into wolves and Robb Stark trying to eat Walder Frey alive - were nothing but a thin mask for their treachery. An imbecile could have drawn the conclusion. But the Bolton's have the backing of the Lannisters, and the larger army. So we all bend the knee and swallow their excrement."

Wylis' voice grew darker and thicker with every word, the anger and shame dribbling from his lips and down his numerous chins. Sansa could feel his outrage, the same horrified disgust that had turned his father so smartly against the Boltons.

_And the loss of his boy. Woe betide any man to give a grieving father cause for revenge._

"When will Rickon return?"

Wylis sat back in his chair and scratched the back of his neck, finally at a loss for words. His lips twisted and he frowned at his (of course) empty plate. "He departed mere days before you arrived, Lady Stark. The straight route hugging the coast would take five days, maybe six... but that man needs to muddy his path and keep to stranger and ill-used waters, to avoid detection. He could take much longer."

"So we _wait_ , is that it?" Sandor spat again, hands spread wide as if to encompass the whole castle. "We sit here and _hide_ while a battle looms in Winterfell? Stannis is a plodding bastard, but when he's set on a course, he doesn't change it. You say he's rallied the mountain clans up here, some of the Umbers, and now marches on Winterfell to deal with the Boltons?"

"You are suggesting we join them and walk into a battle, a siege and a bloody _war_ at the _same time?_ "

Sandor jerked upright so fast his chair toppled and clattered on he floor, arms bulging as he gripped the edge of the table, glaring at another rare man who had survived his brother. "I am suggesting we _do something_ , rather than wait for-"

"My little brother?"

Her words were scarce above a whisper. Both men ceased their war of spittle and aggression and turned to her. The firelight caught her hair and her eyes, grown weary and tired from so much intelligence dumped on her like a sack of laundry. She looked up at Sandor and his shoulders slumped. 

"He's my brother, Sandor. Maybe the last one left, apart from Jon, and he's far from here and cannot aid us." Her eyes dipped and her jaw muscles twitched under her fine, pale skin. "He is the male heir. All hopes and all loyalty from the North would rest with him."

She hated saying it as much she knew it was true, but the cruel, unvarnished truth was no stranger to her now. Sansa had been naught but a breeding mare since Joffrey first became her betrothed; no, worse than that. Not even a living creature, but a line across a piece of parchment, joining one great house with another. A prize to be won, whether by schemes or arms or simple coin. Her hands formed into fists under the table. Gods, hardly ever in her life had she needed to make them, but in that moment, crushed and beaten by the ways of the world and sodding _men_ , she _ached_ to turn them to a worthy victim.

"M'lady..." Sandor began, but did not continue. She studied his face and found words half-forming and then collapsing on his tongue, behind his eyes. Strange how she didn't seem to notice his scars anymore, gruesome and obvious as they were. She saw her shield, her companion, her... "I didn't mean to abandon the boy, but-"

"He will need me when he returns." Her voice was firm again, speaking as if Rickon were sailing on an armed galley rather than being spirited by moonless night on a skulking skiff. "He will be changed, I am sure. I must help change him back. Help him become the man the North will need."

Wylis nodded, relieved sigh puffing from wide nostrils. "That is as I hoped, Lady Stark."

_I'm sure it was. Keep her locked up and safe. Keep her in her place, another card to play if this hands turns rotten. Let the boy lead the North, while the mere girl-_

Sansa screwed her eyes shut and would have bludgeoned that hateful voice into paste if she could. No. _No_. She would _not_ turn into a Lannister, seeing her kin and siblings as pawns or obstacles to power. She would not resent her little brother, always running around on all fours, hands perpetually black, howling like a direwolf and driving a legion of septas to a convent, she was sure. Sansa smiled at the thought, but it was a dry, pained movement of her lips. 

Her eyes found Sandor and her words were cryptic to Wylis' ears. But not to his. 

"Best not to dream of things you cannot have."

Sandor looked away as if shamed by the memory. "Aye, m'lady. But this battle at Winterfell, whoever wins, it will be _worse_ for... whatever the fuck it is we have now. If Stannis triumphs, the Boltons will be laid to waste, aye, but then that fire-worshipping mad bastard-" he spat _fire_ as much as he did _bastard_ "-will be too powerful. You think he will allow your brother to take his seat?"

"If we bend the knee, yes."

"That is what you want?"

"Of course it isn't!"

Her voice shot from quiet to a screech with the speed of a cork from a Dornish wine bottle. Her hands slapped the table and she _relished_ the pain. It made her feel alive, and _useful,_ not just another Stark woman hiding behind her men. She glared at them both, as if they were conspirators against her. The one a lord, working with his father to restore her house but through her brother, not her, preaching caution while her home was set to be destroyed by warring armies. The other, her shield and sword, growling at every development, eager to race off and get killed in another-

Gods. She was so tired. 

"It is not," she repeated, calmer as she sat back down, Sandor reaching down and picking up his heavy oak chair with one hand. "I want a King in the North. Our own kingdom, free from the southrons. For the longest time, I... admired them." Her words swung low again, memories of her tales and stories and dreams rushing past with each blink. Ashes now. Dead as the ones she had lost. "For their finery. Their jewels and manners. Their beautiful maidens and gallant knights, or so they looked. The way they walked as if the world was forever bowing to them, and gratefully. No longer. Just... another song."

Silence descended and neither man could break it. Sansa saw them exchange looks and shuffle and scratch and basically did what men always do around prickly women, as they saw them. The thought quirked her lips into a smile again. Some things wouldn't change, at least.

"I am tired, Lord Wylis. Much has been said and so much of it..."

She shook her head as if in shock and Wylis waved away her excuses, laboriously raising his bulk from the table with a grunt.

"No need to say more, Lady Stark. A long journey, a long conversation-"

"A bloody stupid argument?"

Wylis threw icicles at Sandor and the big man blinked as though her stare could melt them. "Yes. That, too. You will both need to stay in this tower for the moment, you understand. Only my personal guard and maids I trust as much as the men who guard my life can see you. If you were to wander and word would spread..."

He left the rest unsaid, but Sansa didn't need to be reminded. Gods alone knew how many Frey and Bolton and Lannister spies crawled through White Harbor, eager to find some titbit or secret to curry favor with their masters. And those three were just the _immediate_ enemies. Sansa did not want to hide anymore; she wanted to walk the streets and forests and riverbanks of her youth without fear, without a cloak to forever hide her face. But they were dangerous times.

"I understand, my lord. Allow us to finish. Your guards can escort us to our rooms."

"And you make sure mine is bang next to hers, you hear me?"

Wylis smiled and Sansa could have giggled when he made "I'll do my best" sound innately like "go fuck yourself with a live eel". He was gone a moment later and she seized that humor like a lifeline. The candles burned low now and they had been high when Wylis began to speak. Her mind spilled and sloshed with so much, and she did not want to go to bed with such weight in them. 

"Still spoiling for a fight, I see."

"Just want to be bloody useful," Sandor said, sounding more like a grumpy bear than a seasoned warrior, swilling around the dregs of his wine. "Better for me in a battle."

"I meant with Lord Wylis."

"Heh. You'd call that a 'fight', do you? Give over, little bird."

She smiled wider and she saw the flash of a look her gave her, the hint of a smile just before his cup covered it from view. Sansa cocked her head to one side. 

"You'd rather go to Winterfell?"

"I go where you go, m'lady," he said, like a true sworn shield, naturally making her suspicious as possible. "No more to it than that."

"Sandor?" 

She spoke the word sweetly, just to get his attention. When his eyes were fixed on her porcelain face and knowing smile, she spoke again, hand reaching across the table to try and encompass his own... and failing. She was sure that bears had smaller paws.

"Truthful men make rotten liars."

Sandor's eyes became snake-slits at the accusation, but he didn't try to deny it at least. All the words unspoken she'd seen jostling behind his eyes that whole night seemed to take form as he studied the empty wine cup, speaking slow and measured.

"What happens to you, to your house? S'not going to be decided here, with yer brother. It's going to be decided at Winterfell. With blood and steel and fire."

"And you'd take me there?"

She watched his features clench at the idea, but there was more in his taut muscles than denial. Some screed of honesty was still pulling at him, decrying his falsehoods and even his protection of her. 

"I wouldn't want to," he said after a while, not trusting himself to meet her gaze. "But if you asked, I would go."

Sansa stared at him with a smile until he started to fidget uncomfortably. How much they had both changed. Still the same in the flesh, with her flowing hair like a sunset and his scars, a mask fit for a daemon... but Sansa marveled at how life's anvil had banged and hammered them into sterner stuff. He'd taken a vow, and he was being true to it. Knowing that he took it for her made her hand leave his own and slide to his face-

The scarred half. The half that he tried to hide away; the only half people saw. She brushed away the hair hanging lank and thin over it and felt his face go stiff as rock and then seem to melt under her touch like ice. She felt a pang as he did not meet her eyes. Did he not trust himself? Or was he truly indifferent to her affections? Sansa shook her head in answer to her own question. That night, it mattered not. She had asked in earnest and he had spoken truth.

"Thank you, Sandor."

Now he met her eyes. Carefully masked in his newfound duty, and she knew a man hiding when she saw it, even one as fearsome as Sandor Clegane. 

"I am yours, m'lady," he said in a voice he seemed to struggle with, but the words were enough to send a thrill through Sansa, ajolt from fingertip to chest to hips and lower. "To protect you."

It occurred to Sansa that he could order him not to call her that. He could even order him to call her "little bird". But even now the idea of barking orders at him, when he had risked all to protect her without so much as a word from her to spur him... 

Instead she stroked his cheek and was it her imagination, or did he shudder slightly under her touch. He blinked for a fraction longer than he needed, hands at the edge of the table again, holding tight. He wanted to pull away. She could feel it. But... mayhap no-one had touched that side of his face. She felt the smooth, shining pads of boiled-leather flesh and the grooves where the muscles of his face were exposed. The pads of her fingers stroked down to his jaw and did not recoil when they brushed bone at his chin. No words, no schemes or game of thrones and nobles. 

She wanted more, in that she wanted less. She had him, fleeting and faint though he was, and thoughts of her brother and their patron's plans became... bearable. 

Because he was there to endure it with her, and lighten her heart in moments such as this. 

"Aye," she said, and even Sandor looked surprise. Her father's voice, the dry and rustic tones of his people. Her people. She nodded and brushed a thumb under his eye, where the skin puckered and a film of tears was ever-threatening to leak from his eyes. "I'd never doubt it."

That was about the moment he would hurl some barb at her, or pull away, or snarl that she was forgetting who she was. The snakes in Sansa's soul hissed at the idea, thought they'd have no chance that night. She broke the contact first, cutting herself one final slice to bread and dipping it in honey.

"You need more wine?"

He took a moment to reply, and his eyes never left her.

"No. I have enough."

"You mean 'had'?"

A slight pause. One that widened her eyes and caused her heart to pause, better she should hear: "Yes. That's what I meant."

_Truthful men, rotten liars._

 

++++++++++

 

He supposed the castle had some deep, wide, heated baths somewhere in its base, marble-wrought artificial ponds that a man could damn-near swim in while he cleansed himself. That would not do for them, however. Not a couple of dirty little secrets, absconded to a tower and out of sight. Instead they would make do with a room nearly filled by a pair of big metal tubs, lit by a single high window and a scattering of candles so old and worn that wax pooled around them in great white and red tendrils.

Sandor would have groused any other time. Sunk a skin of wine and growled good and long. But that morning he was grateful for the respite. The maid bustled back and forth under his stoic glare, tipping bucket after bucket from the kitchen until the steam rose thick and his bath was ready. 

"Anything else, ser?"

"I'm no fucking ser," he said out of reflex, already unclasping his armor and letting it clank angrily to the floor. "More water, as it cools. And some wine, soon as you can-"

His hands stayed. He looked down at them as if they were alien to him. The absence in them was. Most of the night he'd spent outside Sansa's chambers, still as stone save for his ever-roving eyes. A towering sentinel of metal and leather and scar tissue, one hand always on his bastard, marking every passing face even as they shirked from his own. A night without wine, but his hands did not tremble as his pickled organs cried out for it.

"I'll, ah, find you-"

"Forget the wine. Just the water."

"Y-Yes, ser."

Sandor growled and rolled his eyes upward as the door clanked shut behind him, thoughts of his strange sobriety forgotten. "Fucking people never listen..."

Gods, how long had it been since he'd stripped down to his skin? Greywater Watch? No, they'd just taken his tunic off, then. His clothes itched and stains accumulated but he paid no thought to shedding them. He was a sworn shield, and what good was a shield without armor and weapons close to hand? But the morning had come and Sansa had woken, bidding him in her usual, polite, insistent way to bathe. 

"Don't need you fretting over me like some dirty dog," he'd said shortly, more out of tiredness than rancor and immediately regretting it when she flinched at his words. But she was not the little bird of King's Landing, stunned to silence by The Hound and his half-face and coarse ways. He'd pressed her lips together in a way that stuck with him and crinkled her delicate nose instead.

"I'm not fretting for your appearance. You smell."

_Oh, well, if the lady fucking insists..._

His ill mood lasted only until his felt he water on him. He stepped into the tub and water was up to his thighs, fresh and warm, steam licking and hissing at his lower body. For an instant, as was alway so, the heat on his bare body conjured a flash, just a fractured moment.

A blazing brazier. The stink of coal and wood and melted flesh. 

Sandor breathed deep, sighed... and it was gone. An old hate. An old wound. He sank deeper with his hand on the side of the tub, letting out a shuddering breath as the water lapped up to his belly, his chest, stopped there as his arse touched the bottom. Sandor rested there, head lolling back on the edge of the tub, arms limp and boneless. 

Peace. Something like it, at least. A warm bath that soothed his aching muscles, the stiffness that one never really got used to, no matter how many numberless nights he'd spent on duty in one hall or chamber or another. He knew what a precious thing a good bath was to a soldier; during his training at the Rock, the pups like him were pointed to a horse trough in the morning and expected to be damn grateful. A deep tub in a quiet room was a courtesan's quarters by comparison.

But as his body relaxed and his muscles loosened, so did his thoughts, and that was not welcome. He knew his thoughts should have been on the rickety web of alliances and plans Sansa had ahead of her, and where his place was in it... but it was she who was before his closed lids, not their potential enemies. Sansa. He'd wrapped his life around her now, and what a fucking fool he'd been in the doing. 

His thoughts drifted from the room, the tub, the present. He remembered the shock and stirred longing when he knew she was alive, alive and with that whore-conjuring cunt Baelish. Even then his hands closed to fists at the memory of that smug, taunting smile, sharp little beard and squirming fingers, ever-moving like cuttlefish tentacles. 

The night they'd alighted in the night. The blood and the screams, always more sharp in the night; so often without form to go with the voice. Flashes of torches, one passing so close to his face that the hulking killer had been a child again for a moment, on his knees and begging in a small voice-

Until she'd grasped his shoulders. Whispered fiercely to him. Given him strength in her simple, girlish words and saw him rise. Sandor's face lost the tension of bad memories; the creases eased from it and his single eyebrow crept up his forehead. 

She haunted him now. His thoughts and his wants. His dreams and his memories. All the ones not reeking of blood and death and fear, by his hands and others. She stood strange in them all, by simple virtue of what she was.

Good, despite all she had endured. Honest, no matter how the imp and the whoremaster and the poisoned queen and her mad little shit had tried to break her. Beautiful... painfully so. The kind of beauty that just sharpened with age, a blade that could kill with a kiss. Sandor let his arms sink into the water and ran a wet hand over his face. He felt the droplets race and dribble down one side... barely felt it on the other. Dead skin without sensation. He felt the crevices and cracks there, the horror.

She'd not trembled or paled when she touched him. So close it would have been the work of a moment and his bowing head to capture her lips-

"F'fuck's sake," he said to himself, muffled behind his hand. "Put her out of mind, dog."

As well he might have asked the tide to cease coming in. The water brought a flush to wherever it touched and all it took was the thought of her smiling mouth, her full and scarlet lips, those eyes that could shift from innocent to mischievous in a moment-

The way her bodice had clung to her in that grubby little hut. The sight of her curves, hidden no longer by the soaked fabric. The dark peaks of her breasts pressing against it.

Sandor gulped and his hand slid lower down his body. A single stroke was all it took, twitching thing in his palm suddenly hard and throbbing. Aching. Sandor exhaled through clenched teeth and let the image weave beyond what she had done. He saw her slip one shoulder out of her underclothes. He saw his lips press against that smooth expanse of flesh, glide over her until his tongue and teeth found the hollow of her neck.

He knew how she felt. The softness of her, impossibly fine and smooth. He stroked down himself and imagined it was her hand on him, easing him out of his breeches as he did the same for her slip, sliding it over another shoulder... pulling it inch by inch, revealing more of her until his fingertips could brush a pert nipple. 

Her gasp was in his ear, though his lips made the sound. He'd heard it a dozen times before and it crept into his dreams and those few snatched private moments like this, and he fancied it was his tongue swirling around her nipple that drew it, his hand buried in her hair, a thousand perfect auburn fibers caressing his hand as he pulled her to his lips. Drank deep from her own, tongue warring with hers, sparks crackling off them until she pressed herself to him.

Sandor had made a vow. Only one, his whole life. Even his service to the Lannister's was understood, rather than sanctified. Tywin knew his dog had no need for them; he would kill because he was trained to, fashioned into a sword without the trappings of knighthood. But he'd made it to her, and without pause. 

He grunted and some small part of him warned to ease back. It was shouted down with a grunt born of sheer, painful lust. 

He wanted her. All of her. He should have laid her on that rude wicker mattress in the hut and not let been a single kiss the end of it. He'd tasted her desire for him and it had struck deeper than a lance through his ribs. He'd hidden it, excused it, a hundred reasons and lies he'd told to himself. 

But the ache was there. Beyond his duty and his devotion and his concern. The terrible knowledge that she wanted him to and he didn't know _why_ and wouldn't face it. 

She writhed under him now. Long legs wrapped around his waist, a hot, sweating band of naked flesh that hooked together at his arse, pulling him tighter to her-

His head rolled back as if his neck had vanished. His eyes were filled with her, and no amount of waning would stop him now. He saw her parted lips gasping his name as she was rocked back and forth, face jerking forward to crush her lips against his own as he filled her-

His hips bucked and rolled in the tub, hand tightening as he rode it to his release, heedless to the splashing water pattering on the stones.

Then the door opened and he rolled his eyes, face a mask of frustration. "Girl, I don't need it yet, I've only just-"

"Oh..."

Sandor was suddenly grateful for the steam curling around the room. His slack, pleasured features crumbled as if hit by Robert's warhammer as he saw curling red hair, not mousey brown, and curious blue eyes like jewels in the mist. 

 

++++++++++

 

It was the damn training yard that fooled Sansa, and the sounds issuing from below.

Sandor went off to his bath with pursed lips but no grumbling, and she couldn't stop the smile that came to her face, watching his broad back retreat down the hallway. She'd slept long and deep after their late night; it was already bright when she woke and the sounds and smells of morning had given way to the clangs and shouts of midday industry. But he was still there; ever her shield, as if he would stand there until New Castle collapsed around his ears.

She'd come out wiping sleep dust from her eyes and smiled up at him, only to get a short nod in reply.

 _Still hiding._  

"Still here?" That was what she said instead, and by the time he'd answered the smell wafted over her like something born of sulphur and sweat had died under his feet.

"Until the fat lord's guards begin their day watch, yes."

"Sandor," she said, throat swallowing hard and _gods don't breath through your nose_ , "He is _Lord_ Wylis of House Manderly, our friend and protector, and you shouldn't speak of him so."

"He's the bastard that took a dagger too close to you than I fucking liked," he said back to her in a low, dangerous rumble. But it wasn't fear that shook through her when he spoke and she turned away abruptly, rubbing her cheeks to hide her blush. Gods, she needed to get that under heel. "So he'll be whatever I fucking want when he's not hear to fuckin' bleat about it."

Sansa looked up at him with something close to exasperation, but there was an indulgence there she didn't bother to hide. She would ever be _Sandor_ , even if he had buried _The Hound_ under the cold earth and the helm that was no longer part of him. Gruff and crude and defying the world and all the titles and gentry that populated it. But hers. A dozen times he could have left her, turned his cloak like he sellsword he was more like than any knight, and a smarter man would have done so every chance.

Not Sandor. Not her-

The thought struck her and she dismissed it immediately. Girlish fancies were one thing, but _that_ was something even Old Nan would have chuckled at.

Moments later their last words were spoken and she was back in her room, head still throbbing a little from wine and sleep. She didn't mean to fall back on her bed. Just a little time to close her eyes. A quarter-hour, at the most...

Blackness swallowed her and she was weightless as if under the Narrow Sea, or flying through the air. Memories and fancies that didn't make sense, had no order, no origin, danced before her and taunted her... but there were orbs in there. Twin suns and moons, burning and unblinking. They loomed large over her and she did not understand but did not fear, and finally-

Clashing metal woke her. Men barking and yelping and crying out in victory or in pain. For an instant terror seized her. Had they been discovered? Were the Boltons or their lackeys assaulting the Castle? Where was Sandor? But even as she lay there, stiff and fearful, she noticed... no... there was no terrible, mortal urgency in the sounds. They came together an clanged like a battle in a blacksmith's, but when they stopped...

Harsh reprimands followed, a guttural, growling man-at-arms, and Sansa smiled, both in relief and memory. 

Sandor must have been down there. She wondered how Ser Rodrik would have taken in the big definitely-not-a-knight. Would they have got on well? She liked to think so-

Daggers stabbed behind her eyes and Sansa hung her head even as she sat up. Rodrik. Another face forever denied her. Butchered by the bastard in which the sins and crimes of all bastards were writ large and black. Betrayed, all of them betrayed...

Her hands bunched silk and wool into them under she felt the strain of them, nearly tearing. Was this what it was like for him, all the time? A rage you could never quench? A hate that never died, no matter how many men you cut down? Her breath came out faster, until she stalled it, thinking back to her family, her memories, anything to calm her-

The past held no respite for her. But the future... that held Rickon, and mayhap Bran, some day. Was Arya, too, still wandering the world like the wolf she always was? Sansa looked up and out the stained glass window and smiled. The future was hope. It had to be.

Then she breathed in deep... and frowned... and sniffed her nightdress.

_Hmm. Not the only one, Sandor..._

She made her way down to the bathing room in the tower, the one the servants probably used, passing more than just a handful of Wylis' guards. The lord had been true to his word: the halls seemed thick with his men now, keeping prying eyes blind. Crista, one of the maids, pointed her the way and told her with wide-eyed smallfolk concern that "the big scarred man" was in there, but Sansa just smiled away her worry. 

"I heard him down in the training yard, girl. Thank you, though."

She really should have seen him with her _own_ eyes, though. Because now she was doing the same, but not in the yard. She opened the door, dressed in naught but her nightdress and a wet, soft, flabby fist of hot air slapped her and immediately started to twist her hair. Steam poured from one of the metal tubs inside and she frowned as she saw another person in there. 

If she'd known right away... well, would it have been different? She didn't know. She just stared through the smoke until she could make out features-

Then Sandor's eyes met hers, and she had never seen his face so-

_Rapturous. Like he's in the midst of a dream._

It would ever be stamped on her memory, even as her surprised little "oh" wiped it from his visage. His lips parted and his breath coming out in shallow, nigh-silent pants. His eyes not furrowed with a frown or a glare, but open and smooth as... gods, what was he _thinking_ of? He saw a flash of his tongue lick her lips and felt the need to press her thighs together-

And that was all before she saw the rest of him. 

Her mouth went way past dry and became parched in the time it took for her to try and fail to swallow. His torso was like a map of the North; covered in faded white scars or angry red ones, fresher and without the flesh knitted over them yet. She winced as she saw one of his nipples was nothing but an lump of scar tissue, the end of a healed gash from some forgotten, vanquished enemy that had tried to cleave him open long before. 

A lifetime of war. A history of battles, skirmishes, brawls, duels... every one drawing blood and stealing pain from him. Sansa knew she should have been horrified, but the only shock she felt was at the heat pooling in her belly and dripping lower as she realized she didn't care a fig for his scars. Not when the canvas they marked was so...

_Gods... does he even **have** any softness to him?_

Sansa gulped as Sandor lurched forward like someone had thrown a snake into his tub. What had his other hand been-

"The fuck are you doing in here?!"

"I-I thought you were-"

"You _told me_ to go for a bath, girl!"

Whatever fluster and confusion Sansa was fighting, his sharp tone was enough for her to crack through it. Her mouth clicked shut and she leveled her best clam gaze at him, unafraid to look upon the face that terrified so many others.

"In the first place, I suggested it, considering you smelled like a dead goat-"

"Oi, that's a little-"

" _And in the second_ ," she said, plowing on and by the old gods and the new, he actually stopped talking in shock, "My coming for a bath is not cause enough for you to explode like a keg of wyldfire. You aren't the only one who smells a little... ripe."

She could see the smirk flickering on his face as he thought of a fresh barb to go with her admission, but he apparently thought better of it. Just sunk a little deeper into the bath and glanced around. To the walls, the door, the candles, the window, anywhere but her. 

"Do as you wish, m'lady."

Sansa chose not to provoke him again. Just nodded curtly and walked around his tub, eyes fixed rigidly ahead-

-or they planned to be, honestly-

-but she could help a glance slipping down as she passed him, sprawled out in a tub that could have held two other men comfortably. The steam and film of soap maddeningly covered everything under the surface but she could see more than enough of his thick arms, his shoulders that sloped upward, as corded with muscle as his chest. Wet, black hair clung to him like a carpet, save for the strange spaces where scars had left the skin without a chance to recover.

Her eyes flickered down to his stomach, ridged in levels and hard packs. She'd seen barechested men before, but Sandor... it was his sides, she thought. They didn't have any of the soft plumpness of others she'd seen; his sides tucked in close under his ribs, a vague V-shape of muscle from his shoulders to his navel that aroused something primal in her, some beast that appreciated a fine mate and wanted to-

Her thighs tingled and the wanton image of her running her hands down them, feeling their contours, going lower-

Sandor's head snapped her way and her neck nearly snapped as she jerked her gaze away and kept walking. He growled, low and irritable in the back of his throat and Sansa was grateful for the excuse the steam gave her for the redness that colored her in moments.

 

++++++++++

 

_Don't panic. It's just a girl. You've seen her naked before-_

_While she was being beaten._

Sandor winced and could have ripped out his own brain as images and feelings clashed and colluded. His anger and disgust at how Joffrey giggled and grinned as Sansa was stripped and beaten like a dog; fast on the heels was his lust as he saw her naked, could have seen her again, the shame of feeling so, and then the resignation, the confusion, the fear bubbling under all of it. Gods, he _hated_ this. His life was a clear path to vengeance before her, before the war. All roads leading to Gregor and sweet oblivion after Sandor had his head on a pike. Then so much had followed, so much he could never have predicted... and yet more he could not understand. 

 _You are her shield_ , he mouthed silently, eyes screwed shut. Any other time he might have roared with mirth at how he, The Hound, proud to never be a ser and shitting on all knights, was taking solace in his sole vow. _You protect her. Nothing more. Remember that._  

She was soon out of sight, and thank the gods. The second tub was directly behind the first, and Sandor sighed easy. He could endure this. He couldn't see her, the steam would halt the scent of her and after a while-

That would have been much easier if his ears stopped working, too. 

They pricked as he heard a careless, silken rustling and his mouth grew impossibly dry in a room filled with warm, hanging water. She was naked. Right behind him. Sandor hunkered his head down on his shoulders and willed himself not to turn. The water behind him parted. Gently and quietly, as was her way, as she lowered herself into the tub... and he could see it. See her skin become rosy and glistening, every inch of her-

"Sandor? Sandor, are you-"

His reverie ended with little bird's cooing and he managed to sputter: "Don't turn around!"

"I'm not!"

"Well... good. What is it?"

There was silence and he rolled his eyes. Gods, she was getting her thoughts in order. That never boded well.  

"Tell me about Braavos."

Sandor blinked. Fine. _That_ was a little out of the norm.

"Braavos?"

"You said you would go there, so you must know about it," she said, and Sandor could feel the languid relaxation in her voice. He smiled softly. She was still a girl, at least in body instead of mind, and she'd been without a bath for a while, too. "Can you tell me about it?"

Sandor snorted and he ran a hand through his hair as he thought. Did he know much about Braavos? Only that it was a good place for a sellsword. He thought back to his childhood... heh, what help was he expecting there? He barely remembered anything after Gregor's maiming of him. After that it was shadows and skulking in a keep that didn't feel like home, until Tywin came for him. His training began. More pain, but with a purpose, a goal behind it, and every year that passed Sandor became stronger, quicker, tougher. One master-at-arms after another battered and beat the sense into him to be better than he was the day before. 

Then he frowned. A memory of a courtyard. A great stomping man with black plate and a thin scar down his face, wearing-

"Boots."

 "I'm sorry."

Sandor swallowed and spoke again, unable to keep the foolish smile from his lips. "They make fine boots. A man I knew, when I was a boy. He wore a pair."

The water rippled behind him and when she spoke... he could feel her breath licking at the back of his hair, the lightest, sweetest of breezes. She'd turned, damn her, probably staring at the back of his ugly rock of a head.

_Let her. Just once._

"Thought I-" he started to say, then cleared his throat, wanted to finish-

"I didn't know that."

He should have finished what he started. But instead he glanced over his shoulder, and though it was with one eye in the low light of half-dead candles, the sight of her glowing skin and curious eyes was enough to harden him under the water and freeze his skin above it. He met her gaze and his eyes were sad.

The scarred side. That was what he showed her. He never liked doing that. 

"Fine leather. Not boiled, like armor. They leave it without being sanded or buffed, making it smooth." He didn't even know where the words were coming from now, but he didn't stop them. When had he last just... _talked_ to someone? The boat, probably. Before he growled and she slapped and he... he did what he had to. For both of them. "But it makes it strong. Then they... do something to it. Dunno what, he never told me, but it gives the boots this..."

He waved a vague hand in the air, little constellation of droplets tumbling from his hands as he struggled for the word-

"Patina?"

"Hmm?"

"It means like a skin," she said over his shoulder, and did she seem closer than before? "A pattern on it."

"Yes... Yes, that sounds about right." Sandor studied his hands in the water. He remembered Yarmun holding them up, making him slap the sides of his wrists before his big, knobbly hand could punch him in the face. He was bloodied by the time he did it... but Yarmun had been impressed. It took him a day; most boys took weeks. "He told me they people would come from all over the world for boots of Braavosi leather. They had artists that could paint and carve things on 'em, too. Battles, histories, stories..."

Sansa chuckled behind him and the sound was like balm. He couldn't stop the spread of his smile and soon his own shoulders were bobbing as well.

"What?"

"I can't imagine you in leather boots. Like a bravo."

Bitterness poisoned his smile and his shoulders froze. The light oozed from his eyes and they became stone again. The walls he put up. Stoic and unfeeling.

_Better that way._

"For more handsome men, y'mean? Aye, probably-"

"No! I _didn't_ mean that!"

Fuck this, he was leaving. He didn't need her twittering in his ear like some bird grown large. He braced his hands on the tub and resolved to walk back to his room fucking naked rather than have her watch him dress-

Until he felt her hand on his bare shoulder. She was squeezing and he could feel the desperation, the slight tremble that matched her voice when he stilled.

"Please," she said. "Please don't go. I'd never think that of you, Sandor."

A bark as harsh as a true hound's cracked high and mocking, and that time, he did mean to give her his scars when he turned. "You're still a bad fucking liar, little bird."

"I don't," she said again, and her voice fast became steady. Sandor was oddly proud of her. No more falling apart for his lady. "You can call me a liar and stupid as much as you want but that doesn't change how I... what I think."

She let go. She turned back around. And her turning from him, averting her gaze, rooted Sandor in that tub harder than crying pleas could have. He saw too much of himself in her now. That hardness. The way she masked her pain in ice and let him go... but wasn't that what he wanted? He knew that nothing good could come of something more than the vow they'd taken. It would ruin her and for him... he didn't think on it. He couldn't. It was better for her to be-

_Like you?_

"I believe you."

She turned so fast that a lock of auburn smacked him round the back of the head and he was sure water sloshed onto the stones. He turned again and he held her gaze, across half a foot of steam and stone and possibilities.

"You should."

"I do."

Her smile was small but it shone from lips to eyes to her cheeks and Sandor felt warmed. "Can I ask a favor of you, Sandor?"

"I am m'lady's sworn shield," he said with a wry smile, just to see her roll her eyes. "So I guess so."

"Would you wash my back? I can't reach it."

Gods, she really knew how to smack the fucking smile off his face. Some solid ground under them again and she pushed too hard, like she had no fucking idea what was in his head whenever he was close to her. And yet, it was a request, wasn't it? Maybe even an order, from his liegewoman. Who was he to refuse it? He'd not questioned orders before when Joffrey and Tywin gave them, so why-

 _Because she is not_ them, _and they were not her to you. Stop making fucking excuses._

"I'm not your septa, m'lady," he said, and his gruff growl was back and to stay. "You can wash yourself." 

He turned around and resolved to keep his gaze fucking _welded_ to that door until he was damn well ready to leave. 

 

++++++++++ 

 

Sansa's jaw hung open for longer than was ladylike. Memories of her mother scolding clumsy or surly servants of Winterfell flooded back to her. Her own treatment of Mordane, gods preserve her soul. The savage, incontinent cruelty that Joffrey had meted out to lessers (which was, unfortunately, everyone else) at the slightest opportunity. When a highborn lady _commanded_ , the lowborn _followed_ , and that was-

_You asked a favor. You didn't give a command._

_And he doesn't want to put his hands on you like that._

"Fine."

She bit out the word and fixed her eyes back on the shimmering surface of the tub, little islands of subs and soap floating atop it. She didn't believe that. She wasn't a player of games, not like Baelish or Varys or the others, but she had eyes. She saw things, and she remembered them... but using them? Making something of what she saw? That was still beyond her. This was just one more example.

She saw how he looked at her, with longing that made her blush and the iron-wrought gates of his eyes opening to something he dared not show anyone else. That made her afraid. That trust he had in her, that he didn't even have in himself. The way he would growl in his throat and fidget on his feet, unwilling to snarl at her but unable to meet her gaze. Sansa didn't understand, for the longest time, what was holding him back, when it was just _them_ , alone in a room. 

"Pass me the soap, please."

He complied without a word and she pushed him and their quandary from her mind by keeping her hands busy. She lathered up both hands until they were a single mass of fluffy suds and started to scrub from her scalp to under the water. She heard him start to do the same, though of course he tipped and spilled water like a walrus in the tub, rather than her delicate ripples. Sansa felt a smirk tug at one side of her lips. Big, grouchy bear. Not a hound.

"Finished with it?"

"Yes, here-"

He wouldn't believe her, but she simply wasn't thinking. She didn't just pass the soap over her shoulder, like they were players in some contract that forbid eye contact, as he would have them. Sansa turned half-around to face him and extended the soap as... well, one person to another. 

With the water washing the soap off her, leaving her bare chest clean and smooth and shining. And filling his eyes as they widened-

Sansa did not turn back around. She felt as she did, and he could damn well deal with it, rather than grouse and throw up obstacle after obstacle. Besides, he was sworn to her: he'd best get used to seeing her in _all_ states, not just buttoned up and swaddled in silks and cottons. Her lips quirked briefly as his gaze dropped unwillingly to her chest and she felt the heat between her legs again, the fierce, quiet joy that he had _wanted_ to see her, and she _had_ given him the chance and... and... _fuck_ everything else. 

"San-dor?" She said in a singsong voice that dragged the first part of the name, wiggling the dripping bar of solid, scented fat in her hand until his eyes focused on it. "Soap?"

"Yes. Soap." 

He snatched it from her with a muted "thank you" and turned back around so fast a tidal wave splashed over the side of his tub. Sansa waited for him to begin cleaning himself. And waited. And waited.

"... are you going to-"

"I'll get to it when I'm ready!"

He nodded and bit her lip to stifle a giggle, though he couldn't see her. She stood in the tub and grabbed one of the thick, fluffy towels that the maid had kindly left them, rubbing and padding it down her from toe to crown until her skin was tingling and she could embrace that smooth, crisp feeling that she was clean. Sandor was mechanically scrubbing behind her and she took the chance to give him a last look, reaching down for her nightshirt-

Sansa swallowed. She'd never noticed how his body rippled and tensed and shifted when he moved. His back was scratched and scarred in almost as many places as his front, but they were the longer, more studied strokes of a lash or rod. Punishment for countless mistakes. But now he was not a boy fit for discipline; he was a man, and Sansa couldn't help but appreciate that. She ate him with her eyes, especially when his arms reached behind his mop of black hair to drop suds down his back, and the muscles of his arms tightened and bulged and when she breathed it was in a shudder from her belly.

Sandor stopped. Sansa remembered herself and gathered up her dress. But not before rubbing her hands together quickly to stop the trembling. She fit her body back inside and cleared her throat like a proper lady, standing at the side of her tub and talking over his shoulder.

"I will go back to my chambers and prepare for the day."

"Good," he grunted, not taking his mind off his filthy feet and his scouring of them. "Don't fall asleep again, m'lady. Don't need one of the maids to find you in nothin' but your smallclothes when we need to meet with the fat lord or who-fucking-ever..."

Sansa glared at his back like she could burn a hole right through it. Really? This was how they parted words, yet again? With him growling at her for simply being polite to him? She bared her teeth for a moment and gods, she wished he was more like Arya. Wished she knew foul words and had the courage to spit them out at him for once. But... that was not her way.

Then her rage curdled into a sly smile. A ladylike smile, one might even say. Innocent and pure.

_No. Not my way. But what **is** my way..._

She leaned down by his side. So close to his ear when she whispered that he could imagine her lip brushing his earlobe, every word she spoke sending a pulse of hot air whispering into him. His scrubbing stopped in an instant and he froze as if under a wych's spell. 

"What makes you think I wear _anything_ to my bed anymore?"

Sansa stank of soap and victory as she straightened up and walked out the door, not even thinking of looking back. Let the big bear chew on that for a while, and she knew from experience how fast the mind could fabricate a thousand pages of fantasy from a mere handful of words. The maid bustled past her and she gave a gracious nod. She'd seen smallfolk treated so callously in King's Landing. Regardless of where she rose or fell, Sansa had sworn that she would treat them as people, not lessers. If not, how better were they that the slavers of Essos?

But she did pause long enough when she saw the woman carried a pair of sloshing buckets. She stopped and half-turned, ears straining.

"More water for you, ser, not too-"

"I want it cold."

"S-Ser? What-"

"Cold!" He growled and Sansa had to clamp a hand hard over her mouth. "With ice! Now, woman!"

The maid scurried from the room like a mouse from a lion and Sansa laughed into her hand, leaving Sandor to his well-deserved torture.

 _That was for the potato cart, prickly bear._  

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Three cheers for post-plotting fluffy shenanigans! Fucking Jillypups must be rubbing off on me... though I found this sooooo hard to write. I have no idea how she and others can bang out all the lovey-dovey stuff. It's so draining! 
> 
> And as always, feedback would be much appreciated, especially about the plotsies and schemey-schemes.


	12. Chapter 12

He could have dumped enough ice on his cock to make it look like an icicle, and it would have changed nothing. The maid fled with a squeak and Sandor was left gripping the sides of the tub as if letting go would see him drown. 

_Don't close your eyes. Don't let her-_

He closed his eyes.

_-win. Fuck!_

He saw tapestried covers and thick wool quilts, and her lying in the middle of it all. Pale and smooth as living marble, but warm to the touch, skin raising tiny bubbles wherever he touched. Eyes closed and her hands buried under her pillow, arching her back and stretching her torso, pushing her breasts up higher for his fingertips to tease, caress and circle until they were hard little nubs for his lips to-

Sandor forced his eyes open and when the maid returned, she found him glaring at the end of the tub, hands a mass of white, tight flesh and knuckles that shook the sides of the tub and...

Her eyes widened as something poked up from the water.

"Er... ser-"

"Is it cold?"

"Y-Yes, ser, with ice-"

"Don't fucking ser me and just dump it!"

She did as she was told and Sandor felt his breath freeze and shatter in his chest... and when he looked down, his betrayal was undiminished.

"Ah... fuck it!"

He was out the tub in a single massive whirl of frustrated flesh and a vast wave of water that the maid had to duck back to avoid. 

Sandor needed the _other_ thing to purge this.

 

++++++++++

 

_She was in the woods, but she was not herself. She was more than herself, and less, but not the Sansa that she knew._

_Birds scratching at trees were like horns in her ears. The scent of a rabbit was a clear, sharp trail her nose could follow and her eyes could almost see. The white cotton tail of a jumping deer was a vast banner to her, even from half a league away._

_Her feet did not know tiredness as she ran, swift and sure and feeling no pain though she knew she had no shoes or sandals. Only when she paused did she realize there were four feet under her, not two. She looked down and saw paws capped with claws, messy grey fur covering her... and she was not afraid._

_She thought of Lady, but Lady was dead. Sansa had killed her, even if she'd never held the blade. Her lie had caused it all: Arya's hatred of her, Nymeria's vanishing, and the death of a gentle direwolf that she'd betrayed._

_She felt grief and tears choke her but when she opened her mouth to scream, a howl issued forth instead. Long and sonorous, it curled up from her lips as she tilted back her head, a single, mournful note that echoed around the forest. It was answered. Several times over._

_Sansa ran to meet them. She felt her mouth open and her tongue cold and flapping in the wind, but she ignored it. She could see the smells of her pack, and... she had a pack? Still? Black and grey and brown and dappled creatures that loped and padded, yellow and orange eyes flashing. Sinewy bodies devoid of fat or hinderance, but they seemed somehow smaller, older to her, even though she could feel the shuddering vibrancy of youth in her body._

_A branch like a sapling snapped as something vast stepped from the treeline. The other wolves shirked away from its path. Huge as a pony, as The Mountain would be to an ordinary man, the wolf slinked from cover with tread impossibly light and sure for one so huge. Sansa stopped before her and looked up and-_

_Mother._

_Not a thought. Not even a feeling. Something known, and eternal. Sansa didn't feel or think the dirt was under her feet; it simply was, and she had always known. Looking up into that long lupine face, with the fierce yellow eyes that burned with animal affection, savage pride in her pack and her offspring, she knew who it was in a blink. A whole history she did not know but accepted within a second._

_Soon._

_The voice whispered through her body, trembling though veins and guts and soul until the forest shimmered and shuddered and-_

-Sansa woke and she was in her room. She blinked a few times, half-expecting stone and carved wood and drapes to be replaced any moment by rolling forestry. But... no. It had been a dream. She rubbed her head and sat up, determined not to fall into that trap again. She had not had those dreams since... no... no, that wasn't possible. Lady was dead. Her own father had killed her, and it was-

Her lips curled inwards and tears threatened to fall, but she beat her fist against the mattress until it hurt and no-no-no, she would _not_ cry. She'd cried so many times, for so many people. Father and mother and Robb and Winterfell and Sandor and Lady and Arya. It brought nobody back. The gods did not care. Men would not listen. So Sansa got to her feet after a while and wiped the water from her eyes and focused on getting dressed. She massaged her hand and shook her head.

_Silly girl. Not point to-_

"F'fuck's _sake_ , man! Who taught you how to fucking move?!"

That bellowing, booming vitriol could only have one source, and Sansa looked up at the window surprised. She walked over and heard more steel crashing together, grunts and barks of exertion, then the sound of boots and fists crashing into leather and flesh-

-a yelp like that of a trapped fox-

-and when Sansa peered down below, she saw two men groaning on the ground, practice swords fallen from their hands, and Sandor Clegane standing over them, hands on his hips with his head shaking.

"Stranger's cunt, and 'ere was me hoping for a fuckin' challenge..."

The laugh burst from Sansa's lips almost unwilling. Her hand flew to her mouth as if to catch it but it was too late, and she watched him. Tall and broad and strong... graceful, almost like the wolf she'd dreamed of, but in the way of a wild animal turned to war, not a dancer or an acrobat... he picked his bastard sword back up and flourished it in one hand, final swish seeing it leave one hand and fly to the other as if it were on a string from hilt to palm.

Enough time for the men to get back to their feet and grip their weapons.  

"Now, try again. And this time, treat these things like _swords_ , not fucking _clubs_."

Sansa flew from the window, shuffling into her shoes, mind made up. She wanted no more hours in this damn room, with nothing but lifeless decorations and her own regrets for company. She knew what she wanted, and it was below her, loud and lewd and hers.

 

++++++++++

 

Sandor had quickly realized that one man wouldn't be enough. After the second time he'd put Wulf on his arse, he'd gestured to another fucking merman to come join them. Arnol had gulped down his uncertainty but with his friends around them and watching, he did not have the courage to deny the big, scarred beast. He picked up a practice sword and the two of them circled Sandor, like hounds around a bear.

 _Let's see if they do it **right**_ , he thought in that clear, quiet place his mind became when a sword was in his hands. _Not too close... but not flat opposite, or-_

They disappointed him. They waited until they were flush on his left and right and then came in at once, swinging wide and probably assuming he couldn't stop them both at once-

-Sandor slid hard to his left and blocked Wulf's own sword, other hand shooting out like a mailed mouth and biting into his shoulder-

-throwing the boy into the path of Arnol, still coming at him from the right-

-and the pair of them went down in a squealing, swearing tangle of limbs as Arnol's sword smacked into Wulf's ribcage, just as he crashed into him like a human ram. 

" _That's_ why you don't try that shite," Sandor growled at them as they staggered back to their feet. "Too easy for you to bloody twat each other instead."

He gave them some credit, though; they didn't crawl away like cravens. They got back up and worked the kinks from their shoulders and stood to arms right away. Arnol spit out something not quite blood and not quite saliva, but something in-between. Both of them glared at the big man who'd spent the better part of a half-hour humiliating them, and Sandor grinned.

"Getting angry? Want to put the big southron cunt down? Well, come on and do it. _Now!_ "

On they came, and howling now like the wolves of their realm. Sandor's grin only widened: they were learning. They were in sync now, swinging both high and low-

-he swung down his bastard to block Wulf, but Arnol was going to take his head off-

-until he ducked and stepped back at the same time, snapping his head back up and-

-lashing out with his iron-shod boots, catching the man in the stomach and driving him back-

-Wulf still in the game, thrusting for his belly life he wanted to bury the blade there-

-Sandor parried, and-

-got a fist to the jaw in return, enough to send him staggering a couple of steps.

The other men in the yard muttered and whispered, a low chorus like a ruckus in a beehive. The first blow laid on the hideous southron who'd come unexpected to their castle. Wulf managed a feral smile and... he didn't press the attack. He waited, sword up, until Arnol was next to him again, breath coming out in steaming jets through the morning air. Sandor nodded tersely.

"Waiting until both of you are ready. Better. But you coulda' had me there, boy. You'll regret-"

They yelled and didn't wait for him to finish. Gods, now _that_ was impressive. Sandor knew that when someone got to spewing words in a fight, the other man just stood there and listened, and where was the fucking point in that? No matter what was said, one of you was going to die. Best rush to that conclusion and spare yourself an earful. These boys clearly wanted to win a fight, not just play by the rules of the stories.

_Not that it'll help them._

Sandor moved, and didn't hold back that time. He didn't wait for their blows or charging bodies to reach him; suddenly his black mail and roaring, ravaged face were their entire worlds. The shock of his counter-attack did as much for them as the blows that followed it. They paused, hesitated in their eyes for just a moment-

-and Sandor wasn't slow to wring every drop of advantage. 

Wulf swung for his neck and he ducked under it, jabbing his own sword sharp and painful under the boy's armpit. Arnol was fast at his other side, though, swinging for his leg-

-forcing his bastard to sweep down low in a half-arc, knocking the blade away from him-

-then with a noise between a grunt and a roar he slashed upward at a harsh angle, sending Arnol staggering back to avoid a swipe that could have opened him up from navel to nose-

-then Wulf was on him again, gripping his sword with both hands now one arm was a tingling mass of pain, swinging let, right-

-Sandor blocking both, movements smooth, short, economical-

-grinning as Arnol rushed back to the fray.

Gods, _this_ was what he needed. All fears and thoughts melted like morning mist in this glorious chaos. There was a purity of purpose there was Sandor felt... comforting. He was hardly a man who appreciated art, but he could see a beauty in the way his sword moved, the balance between his flesh and his mind. Parry became thrust became riposte became draw and punch and kick and dodge and it all just _flowed_. Sandor barely saw the seams between his blows anymore: it was all one dance, an endless waltz of steel and skin until he was the only man left. 

No thought of her. Not even an ember. Too dangerous, especially with-

-Arnol growling like a jackal as he dropped down to one knee and swung at Sandor's leg, forcing the big man to slide away-

-straight into Wulf's sword stabbing at his side, and he twisted, blade sliding by him-

Wulf's eyes went wide at Sandor slapped his upper arm down hard against his ribs, trapping the blade in the crook of his elbow, jerking it up and out of his hand-

-looked up just in time to see a forehead half-scarred and hard as oak rush towards him-

_G'night, lad._

Sandor didn't stop to watch him fall; Arnol was already moving again, rushing in with a backhand swing that he avoided, then a kick that-

_Balance is off, boy. Too bloody cocky._

Sandor's free hand jerked up to grab the blade of the sword trapped under his arm and he brought the hilt down hard on Arnol's knee, drawing a yelp from him like a dog and sending him staggering, hopping, swinging desperately-

-Sandor batted the sword out the way with his bastard and followed it a second later with his pilfered sword/club, smashing the hilt into Arnol's stomach first, then his sword arm, then around his nose-

-and that ended the fight for good. 

Sandor certainly wasn't expecting a round of applause from a gaggle of northmen guardsmen, not after he'd beaten two of their friends into the sand. But he did notice the nods from a few of the older ones, and the furtive changing of coin from hand to hand. Bloody hells. Some had actually betted on _him_. That said more than words and cheers every could... and then he did hear applause.

But soft, from bare hands not leather gauntlets. He frowned and followed it as best he could, to an alcove by the stairway-

He saw a curl of auburn waving at him in the breeze from under a hood. Pale hands clapping daintily but loudly, and the proud smile above them.

She slithered into his mind again, shattering that burning ice place he went to when he fought. Sandor came to the yard for respite from her, and the little fucking bird had chased him down there. Hounding the Hound. He scowled and her smile faltered, her face crumbling...

Sandor looked away and cursed his weakness. Even now, he couldn't hurt her. 

"M'lady approves," he said as he walked over, leaving the two fallen bannermen to groan and grunt and try to remember how their legs worked. "I hope?"

Sansa had seen enough to know when she was being thrown a bone: her eyes raised and she nodded shortly, gaze traveling down from Sandor's face to his arms and the sword he still held. "Indeed. A lady could ask no better shield."

"Won't see me much with a shield in my hand, m'lady," Sandor said with a smirk, childish swagger in his words still making her smile, even when he filled his other hand with a dirk. "Better this way. Harder to learn, but if yer quick and know what yer doing, yer a fuckin' demon on the field."

Sansa nodded, but he saw her eyes stay fixed on the dirk. She raised her hand, not afraid but unsure, and before she reached it, Sandor flipped it in the air between them, making her gasp and snap her hand back-

-only for him to catch it by the blade and offer it to her. She stared at it again, some curious artifact she'd never encountered before... and finally slid her fingers around the hilt... and the damn thing nearly dropped from her hand when he let go the blade.

"Heavier than you think, aye?"

"Yes," she mumbled, turning the dirk this way and that, marvelling at the triangular blade and the fine point, "But... better for me than a sword, I think."

Sandor cocked an eyebrow, sheathing his bastard and asking, "Oh? How so?"

"Too heavy. I'm not as," she glanced up and down him a few times and cleared her throat. Twice. "Big as you." Sandor grinned and opened his mouth and without a thought she pointed to him with the dirk. "Don't mention that again!"

"I wasn't, m'lady."

"Still a bad liar."

Sandor just rolled his eyes and reached up, grabbing her wrist like she was a kitten with her claws out, not a woman with a dagger. He looked down as he worked, not seeing her expression, and was probably better for it. His rough fingers arranged her own in a proper hold and he pushed her hand down by her side.

"Here," he said, looking back up to her blue eyes, "Tight to the side, so they can't kick it or knock it from your hands. And don't wave it around like a fuckin' sword. This little bugger is meant for stabbing, thrusting, so you keep your elbows bent and-"

His hand pulled sharply back towards himself, still holding her wrist and she gasped, on the verge of crying out-

-but Sandor stopped just in time, tip of the dagger wavering a fractured inch from his heart.

"-always be ready to stick 'em deep. Now, a man not wearing armor, you're best going for his heart, his lungs. Nice big target, just be careful y'don't get stuck between the ribs and... and..."

Sandor stopped, cold and clinical words freezing on his tongue as he saw her expression. It wavered between shock and horror, as if every word he spoke conjured their reality. She looked at the blade and he could feel her disgust, as if her hand could ever sink a blade into a man so coldly and bluntly. He'd seen her fight before, with the wild, ragged desperation of a girl wanting to escape, but this... 

"Sorry, m'lady," he said lowly, letting go of her wrist, "You don't need to-"

"What if... What if he's wearing armor?"

 

++++++++++

 

Sandor looked back at her and blinked. Something else rose in her; something of fang and claw, not silks and softness. Something that had been growing in her since her father had died. Now it was sharp and hungry and her words... they tried to match it. She wanted to _know_ , because the world was not a place to be ignorant of the mortal arts. Not now, not in the North, not _them_ , always on the cusp of flight or fight. 

His hand reached out again, slower, and gently gripped her hand. Wrapped around her fingers as she held the dagger... and lowered it.

"The guts. Armor's weaker there. Or under the armpit, if you can get that close. The throat it always a good place, but that's high for you, and... ah..." 

Sansa swallowed a breath and her arousal as Sandor cleared his throat and moved the blade even lower, until it pointed between his legs. 

"Codpiece. Balls and cock. Not much armor down there, but if you stick 'em... well, you can imagine how much it'd fuckin' hurt. The inside of the legs, too, got some big veins there. You cut 'em quick and deep, they'll bleed out as fast as if you stuck 'em in the heart."

There was no blush to her face, no girlish embarrassment. Only a firm frown as she nodded, digesting all she'd been told. She held the blade up and pulled it close... stabbed out to the side, pulled it back... elbows bent so better to put force behind her strike. She couldn't imagine being as good as Arya, who'd been swinging wooden swords with Rickon and Bran since she was little, but she could learn this.

 _A dagger. An assassin's weapon_ , she reminded herself, as she experimented and held it reversed. _But you use the weapon that fits you best, and unless you grow muscles like a monster overnight, this is for you._

She sighed, knowing her words were true, but they smacked more of Baelish than her father, or even her own. The world was not the place of fair play and invincible heroes that she'd been raised with. Soot-smeared daggers and cunning sellswords were as lethal as liveried knights and bold warriors. But she met his eyes and smiled at his concern, knowing it well.

 _He wants to protect you. Even from yourself._  

"Strong arms and sharp steel, Sandor," she said quietly, offering the blade back to him with a smile that suggested she could read minds. "About time I learned their ways, too."

Sandor smiled back and pushed the blade back to her with his gloved hands and shook his head. 

"You keep it."

"Sandor, it's yours-"

"You think I can't scrounge up another fucking dagger, m'lady?" He rolled his eyes and a few fumblings of his fingers saw the sheath for the blade freed from his belt and proffered to her. "You'll need this, too. Keeps the blade clean."

Sansa didn't argue. She took the sheath and replaced the blade, holding both in her hands as if it were some grand nameday gift. And when she looked up at him with gratitude shining in her eyes, Sandor looked away and grunted.

"Like you said. Bout time y'learned."

"You'll teach me more?"

"Not today," Sandor snapped, and she could feel his old rancor crawling back. "Tomorrow. Don't need to be too long in the open, do you?"

"I... suppose not." She looked down at the sheath and wondered how she would have it. Left? Right? Across her front, perhaps? Then another thought occurred to her; something Arya would have been proud of. "I could have it around my waist, but... _here_." She turned around so Sandor could see the dagger and its sheath hanging at the small of her back, hidden from the sight of anyone in front. "It could be a... surprise for them. And they'd think me unarmed."

A slow grin spread across her shield's face and Sandor's eyes glinted in a way that bade the redness return to her cheek.

"M'lady, such _deception_..."

Sansa narrowed her eyes and kept her chin high. "Whatever it takes, Sandor. Besides, men never think a highborn lady can fight." She winked briefly and saw something else flare briefly in his eyes. "Let them think that, hmm?"

"Hmm... you may have some-"

 

++++++++++

 

The gates to the main castle opened and without thought Sandor turned and shoved hr behind his bulk with one hand. Wylis was there, ashen-faced but marching with purpose, a clutch of guards behind him and a man covered in sweat and dirt, trailing it behind him in great falling clods, fresh from the road. The fat lord's eyes fell on Sandor within a blink and Sandor scowled back, until the man's face slid round him to see Sansa peeking out from around his arm.

"M'lady, stay out of-"

"Something has happened," she whispered, as much to herself as to him, fear clouding her eyes and drawing the blood from her face. "Gods... I know it's something about him."

Sandor clenched his teeth and didn't answer. He simply stayed by her side as Wylis came to her and gestured for the ragged, bleeding messenger to come with him. 

He listened as the lord spoke quickly, waiting for the messenger to vomit his mangled, weary words and then straightened them for Sansa. He listened to every word, and as they rushed on and on he edged closer to Sansa, as her hands began to tremble and her eyes became glassy orbs-

Wylis reached into the messenger's sack and looked at Sansa with shame, speaking barely above a whisper. 

"Forgive this, Lady Stark."

And Sandor tensed and glared, ready to sweep the girl behind him, his blade out its sheath and through Wylis in the same stroke... but it was no weapon. 

It was a hand, severed at the wrist recently, but Sandor could tell the first knuckles of the fingers had been cut off years before. He frowned, uncomprehending until he looked at Lord Wylis and the man shook his head in sorrow.

"The smuggler," he croaked. "Davos. The man my father sent for Rickon. He... This is... _was_ his hand."

Sandor felt ice creeping up his spine and fill his veins and Sansa swayed next to him.

"Who sent this?" Silence. His hand lashed out and he grabbed the messenger by the collar and nearly lifted him off his feet. "Who?!"

"Snow!" The man squawked, spitting out the word in fear, but Sandor could see it was not for him. His eyes were lot in memory now, in waking nightmares and Sandor knew well that look. He'd seen it in Wylis when he spoke of Gregor; he'd seen it in his own when he was a boy. "Ramsay... B-Bolton's bastard. He-He t-took him... t-took the boy. I-I-I helped D-Davos, wh-when he needed foo-food. R-Ramsay... his men..."

He shook his head and his face twisted in grief and horror and shame. 

"They were waiting..."

Sandor let the man down and Sansa collapsed next to him with a wail held too long that split the air around the castle like sorrowing thunder.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dun-dun-DUUUUUUUUUUUUUN! Bout time for the plot to ratchet up a notch, and I'm SO looking forward for Ramsay to make an appearance. Still haven't got all this worked out, but I'm glad it's starting to build up some speed.
> 
> Kuods, comments, critiques, other c-words that imply opinions or suggestions, send 'em all my way. Wasn't too sure about this chapter.


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's a map of The North, in case anyone needs it. I know I did!
> 
> http://barbariana.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/Map1-1_The_North_AGOT.jpg

After the first day, they stopped opening the cabin door. Broken glass on the floor and dried wine splashed in stains on the door and wooden walls were a mute testament to how little he had to say to them. The crew complained to Vilitus and the Pentoshi had stroked his trident beard and shaken his head.

"Leave his food by the door, and knock. If he eats, fine. If not, he starves and we throw him over the side. Leave him wine, too. I'd rather have him drunk in _there_ than shaking and wandering the _ship_ for it."

He could hear them muttering when they passed his door after that. Conversations would flow and patter and then, as if they were passing a graveyard... their words would still, hush and then continue with slow, whispered apprehension. Mayhap he even fancied footsteps become faster as they passed him, as if they feared he would burst from the door like a tunnel spider and savage them. 

Sandor tried to summon the energy to be offended. He failed.

His face was unshaven and stubbly scruff had since become the start of a beard. His limbs were sore from so long curled up on the bed but he barely felt it; his cramps had faded to a strange, disembodied numbness and he left the cot only to piss in a jug and throw it out the porthole. Plates of food, some only partially eaten, were attracting rats and flies and he barely moved to shoo them-

Apart from when they strayed too close to the single object on the table. Then the speed that men so associated with his name and face returned to his limbs in a heartbeat, and a pair of rats with their necks broken, still as furry tombstones, stood as proof. 

But the carving was untouched. On its feet. He'd been struggling to find the strength to read what he knew was on the bottom, but... no. Tomorrow. Maybe. Perhaps. Not today.

Today he needed more wine, to drown out the sailors and the surf and the gulls.

 

++++++++++

 

There was a great tumult and gnashing of teeth around her, but she saw only shadows and heard only muffled bellows. Her eyes were fixed on the table, where Davos' hand sat, thumb pointing at the ceiling. She couldn't take her gaze off it. There was no sign of Rickon. No letter. Nothing carved on the dead flesh, as Ramsay would have wont to do. Nothing but the severed appendage and all the horrors her imagination could devise.

_Mayhap that was his plan all along._

Rickon was always wildest of their pack. Arya liked to style herself as a latter-born Visenya, or her dear aunt Lyanna, who people still whispered had actually fought at a tourney in disguise when she was a girl... but Rickon had the true heart of the forest. No a wildness, which marriage or children could change in a woman. Something apart from men; savage in the most gentle term of the word, for Rickon was never one to rip or tear or harm anyone. He simply wanted to be free.

Now Sansa saw those memories beside her fears. Rickon barefooted and running through a river, that uncertain waddling sprint of a small child... Rickon tied to a wooden cross, as befit a prisoner of the Dreadfort, with leering monsters peeling the flesh from him and suckling on his tears and terror... Rickon playing with Shaggydog, thrice his size already and yet as gentle with him as if he were the direwolf's own pup... Rickon screaming and begging for his furry friend, but Shaggy was gone, skinned and bled and he was alone... all alone...

"You talk and talk and I hear no _action_ behind your words, damn it! We can't bugger around in the shadows anymore!"

It was Sandor's bark that dragged her back from the darkness. She looked to her side slowly, as if waking from a dream, and found him with his hands braced on the side of the table, scowl sweeping it like his eyes could vomit flames. The other men at the tables - select knights and bannermen that know Lord Wyman's schemes, along with Wylis - glared at him in disdain... but she could see they shared his impotence.

"There is _nothing_ we can do, Clegane," Wylis reminded him, counting off his points on each fat finger. "We do not have the _numbers_ to take the Dreadfort, we do not have the element of _surprise_ to catch the Bastard unawares, and we do not have the _time_ -"

Sandor's hand shot out, accusing finger leveled at the hand as if it had done him personal offence.

" _He_ sent that _here_ , Wylis," he said, not bothering with titles and propriety now ( _when has he ever?_ ). "Why do you think that was? He _knows_ of your father's scheme. Either some spy told him or he carved it out this Davos, but now it is _done_. I'd wager all the gold in my pockets there are ravens winging to Winterfell _this moment_ to tell his father, and _yours_ is under that same roof! We have to do _something_!"

"And what would you have us do?" Now one of the Manderly sers rose quickly to his feet, stabbing at the map of the North that was laid out next to the hand. "Lord Wyman left us three hundred heavy horse but no knights, they all rode with him to Winterfell to join with Bolton. Such a force cannot take either Dreadfort or Winterfell, so _what action_ would you have us make, hmm? A vainglorious charge to take castles without siege equipment, or time to starve out our enemies?"

"Or what?" Sandor spat right back, and Sansa straightened a little in her seat. Her words had awakened her, but it was her own mind that now whirred and clicked as she thought, eyes shifting from the hand to the map. "Stay here and wait for Bolton to finish with Stannis, _after_ he kills this one's father for treason? And what of the boy? You said he was your hope, your rally for the North, and now he is captured you would _abandon_ him?"

 _It is a fork_ , Sansa thought quietly, her mind's whisper a calm in their storm of angry words. _Winterfell to the north and west... the Dreadfort to the north and east... like Fate's crossroads, and we must take on. My brother or... or..._

"We _cannot save him_ , damn you," Wylis rose as well, slapping the table hard and at Sandor's growl hands went to daggers and dirks and swords. "We have not the men nor the time!"

"Then I call you _craven_ for letting him rot-"

All was a sudden whirl of angry movement, Sandor's harsh words driving at the honor of all men in the room. They rose in a flurry and steel hissed on leather, none louder than the bastard at Sandor's hip.

"You _cur_ , you Lannister-"

"We go to Winterfell!"

All the breath and noise was stolen from them as Sansa rose to her feet like a wave, voice slicing through theirs. For a long moment they just stared, and she felt the heat from their gaze. She was but a woman, and she could feel their scorn, wet and unguarded. Her will had driven her to her feet, unwilling to let useless clamor continue, but now she felt her iron start to bend. What did she know? What could she do? She was a fugitive with only a name and one loyal bannerman-

Who placed a hand over hers. Sansa breathed in deep and felt his heart through his glove, or so she thought. She glanced aside and saw his gaze, like forged steel, meet hers, and the nod her gave was all the strength she needed.

_He was right. Sandor always had the truth of it. This will not be done in darkness and secret schemes. Only by the light of day, by by father's walls... in fire and blood and steel._

"My... Lady Stark, what-"

"Your father's plan was to secure Rickon in White Harbor, then use him to rally the North under the banner of Manderly and the Starks," she said calmly, the dry words of another man's schemes coming so easily to her some part of her soul shuddered. But this was the game, as she had been well-taught. If she was to survive, she had to learn to play... and see even her kin as pieces. For now. "Then he would declare himself for Stannis, and together, they could crush the Boltons and the Freys. That plan has _failed_ , my lords."

Her cool gaze took in each face, as if daring an argument. The eyes of hard, battle-tested men met hers... and looked away. She had the right of it, after all.

"Indeed," she said, continuing and walking over to the map. "Now it is time for a new plan, using the only asset we have left. Namely: myself."

That got the reaction she intended. A babbling of stiff-faced, hidebound men who didn't like this girl of not even seven-and-ten suddenly wresting their plans from their soft, careful hands. But she plowed on even as the first words of protest were spoken, stabbing at Winterfell-

-with her new dagger. Just to make her point.

The kind they will understand.

" _Stannis_ is readying his attack. _Bolton_ is there. Your _father_ , Lord Wylis, is _there_." She spoke and remembered all Wylis had told her the night before, picking out the details that had stuck. Once again, she thanked and forever cursed Baelish. Without his tutelage, without suffering his roaming hands and sickening affections, mayhap she would not have learned to think this way. "The Umbers. The Mormonts. The Cassels. A dozen other sworn houses _and_ the mountain clans. The other houses that loved my father and my house. We will ride to Winterfell and join our strength to Stannis' and with the Stark banner flying high next to his. See how fast the loyalty of Bolton's pressed men lasts when they see it. When they see the heir to Winterfell, come home at the head of an army, with Stannis Baratheon at her side."

_Whatareyoudoingwhatareyoudoingwhatareyou-_

Sansa from years past as suddenly shouting in her ears, along with her mother and her septas and Cersei and, yes, even Sandor. All who had scorned her as naught but a pretty dove fit only for twittering sweet and empty words. She believed them now, in the harsh glare of the men staring at her... but she was not that girl anymore. Now the man that had so scorned and scared her was her sworn shield. Now she saw not highborn lords whose words were akin to the Old Gods; she saw men who _needed her_ , if only for her name, and damn them all if she would be nothing but a silent chunk of chattel to be paraded. 

"Lady Sansa," Lord Wylis said, and she narrowed her eyes at his placating tone, as if he were speaking to a girl run mad. "It would be too dangerous for you. Winter is coming, has _already_ come to the North. Snow storms and blizzards-"

"I need no education as to the North, Lord Wylis," Sansa said back, voice as frosty as the weather he forewarned. "I am _of_ the North. The blood of the First Men is mine, and my name, my face is what will tip the scales in this siege."

"What of Stannis?" That same knight who questioned Sandor said quickly. "He is a hard man, Lady Stark. He will not be swayed by your words-"

"As you are not?"

Sandor chuckled next to her as the knight blanched and stumbled over an apology but she did not give him the chance.

"He is a practical man, from what I have been told. He has sought the loyalty of Northern houses and the mountain clans because his own army is depleted. I'd wager none of them can survive _our winters_ -" she flicked a glance at Wylis and to her secret, silent joy, he looked away "-as our people can. He will see the _gain_ in having House Stark swear allegiance to him, and the houses that will follow, like the Manderlys."

"It will not be an easy thing, Lady Stark," said another lord, an grizzled old specimen with a salty beard who regarded her with more depth than the others. "We will march into a place where battle will be simmering, may even be raging. You wager much on your face and the sway it will hold."

"You wagered the same on her brother," Sandor growled at her side, sword clanging on the table as he dropped it. "Now you wager the same with one who has the wit and age to use her name."

Their eyes met and Sansa nodded quickly to him, before turning back to Lord Wylis. His face was tight and thinking hard, hands drumming a mindless staccato beat on the table. She did not falter as she locked eyes with him, every inch the woman that had doused the angry flames the night before with sheer, desperate will. Only there was no desperation this time. Her face was set and her eyes were stone.

"The North remembers, Lord Wylis," she said, and the lords and knights stiffened at her words, as if the lessons of their youth had grown flesh. "And they will remember _me_ , and my _father_." 

 

++++++++++

 

_Fuck the gods. The little bird has become a bloody hawk._

Once again Sandor was ready to wet his steel with highborn blood and once again Sansa stayed him. But whatever frustration he would have shot her way paled when he started to listen to her. Fraction by fraction, his frown vanished, his furrowed brow smoothed and he looked on her with something close to awe as she jabbed and thrust at the lordlings with her vision.

And that's what it was. A vision. Born from all she had heard and seen, compiled and built from the same intelligences that the Manderlys had tried to ply into a secret plot.

_Now she has her own._

He spoke only once to support her, sword clattering as loud as he could manage as a counterpoint to his words. Eyes that were still brimming with disdain and anger at him were now wide when they looked to her, and Sandor kept his neck fused so not to shake his head in awe.

_She's winning them over. Bugger me..._

"Lady Stark..." Lord Wylis said, rising at the head of the table and licking his lips when he paused, eyes flickering around to his handful of co-conspirators. Sandor's jaw clenched as he saw the familiar signs of a man looking for a weakness in an argument, _any_ excuse to discount her bold plan. "What you propose is... daring, and would be worthy of songs if it gained victory-"

"Life is not a song, Lord Wylis," Sansa said, and Sandor dipped his head to hide his slight, proud smil. "And my grandfather used to say that 'everything a man says before he says 'but' doesn't matter'." The smile on her face was almost predatory and Sandor's smile vanished. "Which is what you're getting to, is it not?"

"It's just... I mean that..." Lord Wylis glanced around furiously, and Sandor could see he sought to gain some support from his comrades. Sandor was no strategist nor schemer, but he knew men... and he knew from their looks that they were no longer his comrades. Sansa's words had worked their will and had given them fire again. _Purpose_. Unity under a banner they had all loved. Set against that, with no more shadows to skulk in, Wylis and his father's schemes were set to nothing. "... it... it is a sound plan." Then he looked her in the eyes, and for a moment, he was not a lord. He was a man, and his voice was low. "But what of Rickon? If Winterfell falls, if Roose Bolton is taken, the bastard might..."

Sandor froze and kept his eyes on Sansa. Her queenly visage cracked, but only for a moment. Her eyes shone and she blinked for a long time, the suggestion of tears at her lashes. She breathed deeply... exhaled... and let another part of her soul slip away.

"We cannot save him," she said, voice dead calm and telling Sandor much. "My father told me once it took two years for his ancestors to starve the Boltons from the Dreadfort. We do not have two years, and nor does Rickon. If he-If something-" She shook her head and Sandor saw her hands close to fists. "He cannot-We cannot let him hold us back."

Sandor wanted to embrace her. She had something he'd only dreamed of: a brother she loved, and loved her. He'd been too weak and too far to protect his sister; now she had to watch his little bird endure the same horror. He looked at the floor and his hand twitched, as if to reach out... but he stayed it. 

_She needs to do this. Gods help her, but she must._

Sansa looked up at Wylis again with a rush of breath, eyes impenetrable and implacable once again. "If Ramsay learns of his father's fall, then he will _also_ learn he will have no place to run, and Rickon Stark safely returned to his house will be the _only_ thing keeping him alive," she said, voice lowering to a nigh-feral growl that even Sandor blinked at. She spoke not an ounce of mistruth, and he would not call a liar a man who could see she would draw and quarter the Bastard of Bolton herself if any harm befell her brother. "It is-It is a chance we must take, Lord Wylis. Rickon cannot help the North now. _I can_. That is the cruel truth of the world, but that is the world we live in."

She leaned across the table, elbows bent and arms braced, and Sandor could have blinked and in-between light and darkness, saw a wolf ready to pounce.

"What say you now, Lord Wylis?"

"I-I say... we march on Winterfell. At last."

" _Good_."

The brief screech of metal ripping out of wood was enough to make half the men flinch. Sansa retrieved her dagger and sheathed it swiftly... and Sandor saw her hands trembling behind her back. But her front was the queenly mask she wore before, chin high and shoulders straight. 

"We will need to move quickly. How soon can you have our forces ready to march?"

"My midday tomorrow, Lady Sansa," the quarrelsome knight said sharply, and Sandor noted the belligerent old fart was actually standing to attention. "If we put the word out tonight."

"Do so."

"If there are any spies in the Harbor-"

"There doubtless are," Wylis said, tone resigned but still firm. It was not _his_ plan and he hated that, but it was still a _good_ one. "But it will not matter, when we ride out of here with Lady Stark among us. Let them know." His smile was grim but there was a fierceness there, something he shared with Sansa. "Let their masters get their ravens and shake at what comes for them."

Sandor's lips quirked in a brutal smirk and some part of him purred in pleasure. Back to war. Back to battle. To fields of screaming men all rushing to feed his blades. It had been too long. Sansa nodded her approval and took in the room with one last turn of her head. 

"We are resolved, my lords. I will retire now. We have long days ahead of us."

A chorus of scraping chairs to let men stand and their lordly bids of "well night, Lady Stark" echoed around the table and Sansa nodded politely ( _no curtsey, heh_ ) before turning on her heel. Sandor fell in behind her without a backward glance and the door closed behind them. He thought of those craven bastards as they walked back to her room. What would they whisper of now they were gone? Could they be trusted? Would Wylis try to fold Sansa into some new scheme? Would their force be ready in time, as promised, or would fresh and imagined delays keep them in White Harbor, imprisoned with all but bars? 

Sandor's scowl returned, torches casting daemon shadows over his face as he walked. Part of him hoped so. His Lady's words were fine, but some men needed some _fear_ before they fell into line, and The Hound knew her to conjure that and deftly. 

She entered her room and walked by her bed and... paused. Sandor frowned. Something was off. One hand went to her forehead and the other to the post of her bed and her feet rumbled under her-

"Sansa?!"

-and he scooped her up, mind back in that hut, mere days before but a century ago, when she was still a shivering girl in soaked rags. Her body was shaking and trembling as he sat her down and when he turned her to face him, her face was twisted and covered with flowing tears.

"I've-I've killed him," she gasped between wet breaths, words blurting out and without sense, head shaking and hair hiding her eyes. "He'll... He'll kill-kill Rickon. Gods, Sandor-"

Sandor stood there for a moment, frozen and uncomprehending. Something very close to fear gripped him as he realized he didn't know what to do. He couldn't growl or snap his way out of this; harsh words would only bludgeon her even more, and she'd done enough of that to herself. He had no time to formulate anything; his mind was blank when she looked at him, broken and needing him and he knelt before her as if to make yet another vow-

Closed his hands over hers, wrapped them in warmth and his hard, strong grip. 

"Sansa," he said softly, and was stunned to find the gentle words coming from his mouth. "You did the _right_ thing. The only thing you _could_." He hazarded a fleeting smile. "I couldn't have struck such a mark. Ain't got the wit, but you?"

"I abandoned my _brother_ ," Sansa ground out, eyes already puffy and red, despair dripping from her gaze. "You wouldn't know-"

She stopped herself but Sandor didn't need more words. He knew what she meant, and yet he felt no anger towards her. Not in this moment, when she needed him to be strong for her. He shook his head sadly and stroked her cheek with his knuckles.

"No. I wouldn't know. But you would, and you did the best for everyone anyway."

He cupped her cheek and for once, for the first time in years, he let no bars nor walls hide his eyes. He looked into hers and smiled, and prayed to gods he hated that she would see not the scars that ruined him, but the light that she'd lit in him years before, and never even knew.

"I am so proud of you."

Sansa smiled and yet she still shook her head. "I can't... I can't do this, Sandor. It's too much. Too many p-people... if I fail, so-so many could die." Her voice lowered to a whisper and she grasped the side of his neck, warm hands so thin and lithe yet weighing on him like lead blocks. He waited for his breeches to twitch and tighten but his mind growled at them to fucking behave. Now was not the time. She dropped her gaze and he voice cracked. "I'm not strong enough."

He didn't know what to do. She was broken and breaking down yet more and he'd seen men and women fall like this and never rise again. He'd told her as much, on that boat, and he'd meant it... but he couldn't let it happen to her. Not because she had done the right thing, and sacrificed what she loved so her realm might be free from war and pain. She'd given so much, and all the world had returned was sorrow.

So Sandor threw himself into the unknown and to hell with tomorrow.

She needed him, and damned if he wasn't going to deny her his strength because of his fucking fears hidden as scruples. _A dog will not lie to you_ , he'd told her long again. Sandor had sheltered behind his own lie for long enough, and though he cursed himself as he tilted his head towards her, he felt a weight fly off his shoulders and vanish into the distant, star-scattered sky.

 

++++++++++

 

He was so close to her. His musk of leather and sweat and quiet, animal power surrounded her and it calmed the heart beating erratically in her chest. The whole walk back to her chambers, Sansa had been screaming inside her poised skin. Her lip quivered but the rest of her walked surely, betraying nothing. 

_Your own brother. You damned him. You abandoned him as much as they did. Left him to a beast that plays at being a man._

She'd opened the door to her chamber and as soon as Sandor closed it behind them, she felt the crushing weight of all she'd said slam into her like a hammer to her guts. She tried to walk and her legs lost their bones. Her breath was shards in her throat and her vision swam, danced and he balance vanished under her feet.

Strong arms that lifted her like a child saved her. They always did. But they weren't enough to stop the dam that burst behind her eyes when she was on the edge of the bed. Tears and grief and horror that she'd felt before, only now with an extra knife twist, wielded by her hands. Her father... her brother and her mother... she'd wept for days when they'd been taken, _betrayed_ by those they'd _trusted_. 

_Now you have done the same. Do you weep for Rickon, or for you?_

She couldn't look up, not in his eyes. She wasn't worthy of anyone's gaze anymore. She'd cast aside her little brother to win the game, to gain the army that Wylis and Stannis might give her. She'd played the damn stupid fucking game, and her brother's blood had been her cost of admission. She was no better than Baelish, or Lord Tywin, or-

Then she listened to him. To gentle words and the tone she guessed no-one ever heard. She felt his hands on her own, on her face and she managed a shaky smile... but it was still not enough. She hated herself for doing this to him, too. He knew she was not a man who dealt well in affection, yet here she was, pouring her tears and her weakness onto him like wine. He rested her arms around his neck and breathed him in, trying to still the quake and shake of her shoulders, rocking up from where her lungs squeezed her heart.

"I'm not strong enough."

She wasn't. She knew it now, and-

Sansa gasped against his lips as they were pressed against hers. Her eyes popped wide but her hands did not move. They gripped tighter, guilt and shame vanishing as she drew deep on the well of want she'd been digging for years, starting so long ago in King's Landing. She pressed back against him, tasting his chapped lips and the twisted corner that had not escaped the flames. Her hands slid from his neck to his cheeks. She breathed in as if he air in his lungs was nectar to her, parting her lips and daring to stroke his lips with-

-only it was his tongue instead. That final admission. If his lips had remained closed, it would have been one thing, but to allow her to...

She moaned softly and felt his low growl shiver through her tongue to the back of her neck and all too soon he'd parted from her. His eyes were unguarded now, lanterns without the glass, a fortress without its walls, his hands cupped her face, dwarfed it but his hold was almost delicate, if that word could ever apply to Sandor Clegane.

"Yes, you are," he said, in a voice she scarce knew as his own. "You weren't before. But now you are. And I would follow you through the hells if you asked me."

The moment stretched but did not wane. It was stolen and thus precious, all the stress and strain of the years coalesced into one moment that was _theirs_ and it could not be taken. Sansa would have burned those stories and tapestries of dashing knights and fair maidens; they were a pale shadow compared to this, to him, to what he gave her. In spite of all they had yet to overcome, the ranges of mountains they had to climb, she would have kept that moment forever. 

He had never been more hers. She would know that from the bare look in his eyes and the devotion that came not from rage or hate of blood-lust, but from love.

"S-Sandor-"

He drew away and it seemed to pain him, but it was what he had to do. Dawn would come and a sea of troubles with it. Convincing a room of lords was one thing, and hard enough. Stannis and the rest of the North were on their horizon, and they had to ride to meet them, through ice and snow and most likely death. She wanted him to stay, so badly that when he moved from her she felt some part of her go with him. 

_He protects you even now._

"Sleep well, Sansa," he said, and in a daze she watched him gather her hands from his face and kiss her knuckles. She stared at him and realized her tears had stopped. She saw his face rise again to smile at her and she did see his scars, and the damage Gregor had wrought... but all of it was him, good and ill, and now she had something more to hold in her heart that would sustain her. "I will be outside."

He was halfway across the room before she spoke again, finding her voice and her feet-

"Sandor?"

He stopped. His hands were in fists. She could feel the... was it fear? Shame? When he turned there was something, rendered low and muted by the candlelight, but it was so close to sorrow she could have wept again. But she did not. He had quenched her tears and she knew she would sleep deep and mayhap without daemons to trouble her. She would carry his scent and his taste on her lips, and her fingertips brushed against them.

Sandor's jaw clenched as if angered but it was not rage that darkened his eyes when he looked at her. Sansa smiled and walked to him. He tensed, like a rabbit ready to run, as she leaned closer-

-and kissed him on his scarred cheek, pausing only to whisper in his ear.

"Thank you."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> FUCKIN' FINALLYYYYYYYYYYYY! And all it took was 54K words. Arncha' glad ya' waited? ;-)
> 
> Y'know the sound Pacman makes when he eats those little blue dots? I make hat sound when I read your comments. Just sayin'...
> 
> This flowed MUCH easier than the last two, even if it was a little dry. Trying to get everything straight and believable in my head is... phew... I dunno how fox and pups do it! And the ending, well... that was a sop to my two favorite ladies and their shipping fluff. But it seemed well-timed and what she needed, so I think it works. Think I'm wrong? Lemme know otherwise.


	14. Chapter 14

He longed for sleep; for oblivion. Black and deep and featureless; no noise, no memory, no end. But Sandor was a sworn shield, and considering it wa who he was shielding, sleep was not an option.

He stood erect and unmoving outside her chambers for hours, torn between kicking it down and running from it, body straining under his skin now and then from one or the other. He stared hard at it and the roasted and long-useless tendons on his left side twitched and spasmed, reacting to his discomfort. 

He would never get that taste off his lips, and even if he did, he could not fore it from his mind. Sandor thought he lips had been sweet, but he'd not tasted what was beyond them. Warm and wet and-

With a grunt and a blur of black mail his hand slammed back against the wall. The pain ripped through him like lightning and it shattered the image before it even formed. Sandor snarled and screwed his eyes shut.

He thought of Gregor. The memory of him laughing as his massive hand held him in a grip like stone, tiny hands batting against him as he begged. The smell of his face, like roasted pork, bubbling and dribbling down his face and sizzling on the flames. 

Sandor lost himself in his nightmare until his molars cracked and his eyes welled and every trace of his _insanity_ in that fucking room was banished from his mind. 

But when his eyes opened, the hallway was still there. Night loomed and long outside New Castle and there, behind an oak door ribbed with iron, was the girl his stupid arse had fallen in love with. Sandor shook his head and tightened his grip on his sword.

_And worse than that? She's gone and fallen for you, dog, and what did you do? You kissed her!_

"Fucking _idiot_..."

"Ser?"

His eyes snapped to the querulous warble at his right and the two Mermen ( _might as well call them that, with those fucking stupid spears_ ) who were eyeing him curiously nearly jump out of their silly cloaks. Sandor doesn't bother keeping the snarl off his face. He's aching for a reason to lose control, and he knows it. Just one word, one gesture or sneer or grimace at his scars, something, _anything_ -

"We, ah... we're here to relieve you?"

"What?"

"It's near the fourth hour, ser-"

 _That'll do it._  

He's at the pair of them in three strides and the speaker, a middle-aged man sliding to fat but mainly in the cheeks, it pushed against the wall like a siege ram just smacked into him, Sandor's other hand on his sword. Twin infernos spit at that pudgy face and the guardsman swears the snarled words are coming straight from them, not the lips below them, and all he can see are shining slices of ruined flesh and dried pus and-

"How many _fucking times_ do I have to _fucking tell you people?!_ Do-not- _fucking_ -ser- _me!_ "

"F-Friend!" The other man can manage a little but of wits, apparently, though not much courage. He clasped the trident as if it were a talisman, not a weapon, rendered as a child by the towering savage holding Edwin against the wall. "We-We were sent b-by Lord Wylis, please, don't-"

"I am her _sworn shield!_ " Sandor snapped again, teeth gnashing with every word now, the Hound come to a frothing fore from a distant grave and bad memories. "I do not get _relieved_ , you fucking moron! So what was the plan, eh?! Get me out the way? What did you plan for her?!"

Caelum's jaw dropped and it trembled as he shook his head, thoughts wiped clean from his mind by the man's accusation. He just shook and shook until some semblance of order crept into his head and finally stammered: "N-Nothing, L-Lord Wylis w-wanted us to-"

"To what?!"

"Sandor?"

He was a furious dog and he would have ripped these two pups to pieces given a longer time, but with one note, chirped so confusedly, he was leashed and shamed. He didn't need to turn around to know who it was; nor to hear the surprise and the concen she managed to load into one fucking syllable. She would see him holding a now-purple-faced Merman by the neck and growling at another like a madman, spitting words of conspiracy and treason and worse. 

_Not hours before you spoke soft to her and swore yourself anew. That meant much to her. For a moment, just a moment, you were what she and Annayln always hoped you'd be._

_You just can't help but fuck things up, can you?_

"Sandor, what is going on?" Didn't take her long to shake the sleep from her voice and put some steel in it, though. "What has this man done?"

Even that stung. She never thought, despite everything, and everyone, that _he_ would be the one at fault. Surely they must have provoked him, or erred in some way. Sandor let the man go and he glared until the shaking man looked away, leaving something of a puddle under his feet. Sandor's nostrils reeked of it and his lips peeled back from his teeth as he spoke. 

"Get a fucking cloth and-"

"Sandor?!"

Gods, he wanted this night over. He turned to her and saw confusion warring with her anger, that he would terrify some poor man just for doing his duty. She looked at him as if she were trying to match the man that had spoken to her before and the animal she was witness to now. He chest heaved under her night robe and her fingers clutched it closed, mouth parted as if in shock.

"My Lady, I-"

"I would have words with you," she said, voice as smooth and commanding as a queen's, brooking no argument. Her gaze shifted to the two Mermen and Sandor felt a flush of jealousy as it softened, apologetic smile stretching her lips. "My apologies, gentlemen. My shield is not himself."

_No. This is exactly what I am._

"N-None n-needed, Lady Stark."

"Oh, but they are," Sansa said, and Sandor caught the hint of a threat in her tone as her eyes flicked back to him. "Carry on with your duties. You will be troubled no longer."

"Thank... Thank you, m'lady."

She held the door open and stepped inside, waiting at the handle for him to follow her, and the glint in her narrowed blue eyes told him not to press her further.

Sandor swallowed hard and stalked into her chambers.

 

++++++++++

 

She was having the most wonderful dream.

_They were in Winterfell, and they were beyond danger. The certainty was lodged in her mind without her questioning it, like she was a girl again and the War of Five Kings and the Red Wedding and the Battle of Blackwater, all of those horrors were as distant and fantastical as the Doom of Valyria. She walked through the godswood and crisp, frozen leaves crunched and rustled under her feet. The cold air nipped and bit at her rosy face but the heavy wool robe kept her warm, a spectator to the weather rather than a victim of it. Every gust bought a fresh wave of red and yellow and gold leaves pattering around her and she was looking for someone._

_She saw him by the weirwood. He was sharpening a sword._

_Sansa cocked her head as something tingled in her mind. Was this a memory? Was it even her memory? But it must have been hers, because when the man looked up from steel and whetstone, it was with a face half-burned, hair hanging over those scars, curtaining harsh grey eyes._

_Which softened when they saw her, and the smile that bloomed on his face made all his ugliness vanish. He placed aside his weapon of war and beckoned to her, eyes gone from guarded and cold to warm and inviting. She sat in his lap and he was like a mountain of warm flesh around her, decked in wool and cotton and a bear pelt, the only animal that could cloak his entire form._

_His arms completed that fantasy. The wind held no purchase any longer, and she heard his heart beat impossibly loud as she cuddled closer into him. His words were a low murmur that vibrated to her soul without seeming to pass her ears._

_"Looking for me, little bird?"_

_"I thought you'd be out here."_

_Strong hands, callused and scarred, were gentle as they tilted her head up. "And why would that be?"_

_She smiled and kissed him. That time he didn't draw away. Leaves rushed and whispered around them and the distant sounds of a castle at work comforted her. This was home; where she belonged. That place and those arms._

_"I just knew."_

_Then there were shouts. Growls of anger and high squeals of excuses. They sprang from the thin air and as he looked up sharply he vanished, it all did, and Sansa clutched him tighter with a plea forming on her lips because she didn't want to leave-_

-and she woke to his mad rage and flung open the door just as he was on the cusp of true violence. 

Her first reaction was simple shock. How could a man be so changeable? _No_ , she corrected herself, even as she gazed at his twisted face, hot and flushed with anger, _how could **he** change so much and so quickly? _

It was the work of a few choice words to defuse the situation, and she reminded herself to ask after Lord Wylis come the morn and check on his men further. They didn't deserve such treatment. But when the door was closed she turned all her attention to the towering man pacing in her room like an animal, stalking from wall to wall as if caged, yearning to be free from confinement, to lash out at anything that came close. 

"Sandor, what-"

She stepped closer to him and he stopped-

-and the glare he shot her rooted her feet firmly into the stone and robbed her of breath.

"Sandor... what is _wrong?_ "

"Don't wanna talk about it," he bit out through clenched teeth, slumping down in a chair by the hearth without even a by-your-leave, longsword propped up against it, bastard unsheathed and close to hand. "I'll sleep here. Go back to your bed."

"Sandor, what did they-"

"What did I just say?!"

"Damn you, _talk to me!_ "

"About _what?!_ "

He was up so fast the movement was almost a lunge, and she cringed from him. Her shield. Her _friend_ , gods-damn-it all. Her only true friend, and she backed away until she felt the poster of her bed thunk into her back. Trembling took her and the blood leaked from her face. He saw it and his rage abated, but did not all the way subside. He stood there almost panting until he shook his head and swept his hand across the table with a bellow-

Pain. That was what she heard in that wordless blast of noise. Not anger, not hate. Anguish. 

Crockery flew and shattered. The bastard sword clattered onto the stone and fruit either squashed or rolled away, until the table was bare and empty and he was facing away from her, head buried beneath his shoulders as he bent low, hands braced on the wood. 

Mayhap she heard whispers from him, mumbled and broken words that leaked from his lips like a prayer, or a curse. For a long time they stood that way, close and distant, with naught but the crackling fire breaking their silence.

"... Sandor?"

His voice was like a lead block dropped on the ground. "What?"

"Please, just... look at me?"

He turned slowly, reluctant but eventual. Eyes that snapped and flared with constant dark activity were glassy and flat now, like a gigantic doll's. Sansa swallowed and hazarded a step to him. Then another. She felt like she was trying to soothe a skittish animal, like Lady when first they met, the wolf's yellow eyes still suspicious and her teeth showing. By the shadows from the hearth she could barely make out his features; he'd turned from it and she saw only the dual glimmers from his eyes, but they called to her. 

"I know that you don't want to talk," she said patiently, wringing her delicate hands together as she sought for he words. "But I know... I can _see_ , something troubles you." She paused but he gave no hint to his pain. Just stared at her from the cave of his hair and the crags of his face, licks of flame casting strange shadows over his scars. "You have ever been my friend, Sandor. Not always a  _nice_ man, perhaps-"

Now it was a smile she hazarded, and something that could have been a bitter laugh was grunted her way.

"-but a good one. You don't see it. Maybe you don't... maybe you can't see it-"

"You sung this song before, on the boat," his voice was low and dead and blank, and it frightened her more than his raging. There was a horrible sense of _control_ in it; that he knew what he was doing and would see it through. "That didn't go well, did it?"

Sansa remembered. She remembered what _he_ said, too.

"Are you afraid?"

"Of what?"

"Falling?"

Sandor's head twitched as if he were trying to bite at his own ear and yet his bearing seemed to relax a fraction. His shoulders lowered and he stepped closer to her. She was suddenly aware of how huge he was next to her, the shadows from the hearth making his own seem so large that they swallowed her as he approached, like The Stranger come to claim her. She bit down hard on her bottom lip and her hands clutched tight to themselves.

"You-You don't have to be," she said from under his shadow, at those cold grey eyes. "Not anymore."

 _Not after tonight, before it went to the hells. Because I saw how you feel, that you can feel, and it scares you._  

She reached out and grasped his hand, stroking her thumb over his hairy knuckles and smiling with her bottom lip curled in as they tickled her skin. 

"I'm scared, too."

 

++++++++++

 

_I'm barely even a man. I'm good only for death and blood. I'm a walking weapon and I know little else._

_I would ruin you. This would ruin you. I would hurt you and it would kill me._

_I'm better alone. Better without feeling what I do for you._

_Run, little bird. Please. Before I lay you to waste like everyone else in my life._

"Sansa..." He spoke and his voice was a croak. All those truths in his head and he should have shouted them all. He should have raged at her and called her every name under the sun and scared her from him, until she hated him, feared him, _despised him_. It was more than folly; it was madness. His mind was a whirl of all he wanted and all he knew and every sick and awful deed he'd said and thought. 

He was unworthy. Would always be thus. Not just because of his scars or his crudeness or his love for the sweet, crisp taste of a man's life when he took it.

He shook his head and looked down and Sandor didn't even know who he was anymore. Except that it was no man fit for her.

"I'm sorry..." 

She had just made that hardest choice of her life, one that scooped out a fair chunk of her guts and left them on the table next to that dead fucking hand, and he'd done what he could to aid her pain... and then in the space of an early morning, he'd smashed that to rubble like he'd been wielding a hammer in a greenhouse. All because he couldn't control himself, didn't _know_ himself, and couldn't find the courage to _try_. 

_Fine shield you are, dog. Fine friend._

But still, he could not deny her. Her merest touch sent ripples through skin that had taken arrows and dagger slashes with not more than a grunt and a curse, calming his rage and weakening his knees even as he stood. Sandor's jaw clenched again and he wanted to-

 _No. You are not so weak, because she needs you. Save your self-pity. War comes and from more than one quarter, and she marches into the slaughterhouse._  

Sandor's lips quirked into almost a smile, and he squeezed her little hand. He looked up and saw her face brilliant in the firelight, every facet of her beauty glowing and bright and he he felt a fresh wound in his guts because he knew it was for his worthless, wanton, wicked well-being. She smiled so wide her teeth were showing, as if she were on the verge of laughing and Sandor finally broke-

 

++++++++++

 

His arms were around her in one desperate burst of movement, and some shade of Sansa's dream returned to her. He crushed her against his chest and Lady Stark coughed and spluttered in a very unladylike fashion until her squeezed lungs found room to refill themselves. But when they did her arms were already around his chest, hugging him tight as she pressed her face to his chest.

He didn't speak. Didn't make a sound. Just breathed steadily in the middle of the room, holding her like he'd fall to dust if he didn't. Sansa spread her fingers across his back and stroked up and down, not... loverly, mayhap, but reassuring. Letting him knew she was there, and wasn't leaving. 

Such pain. He hides it so well, and such hate... but he bears the worst of it for himself.

"Sandor?" She said after the longest time, roused from their embrace only by the sound of a blazing log finally collapsing in on itself in the hearth. "I... We need to sleep."

"Yes." His voice was close to normal now, but low. Tired. Spent. Even his low laugh was more like a death rattle. "My words, aye? Long day ahead."

"Well," she said, managing to inject some of her coy amusement into it, if only for his benefit. She leaned back in his arms and looked up. "It's been an eventful night. One can't expect to sleep so easily when so excited, hmm?"

He rolled his eyes and she felt her breath shudder as she exhaled. There he was. Back from the brink. Wry and mocking and as she liked him. "You do love playing the highborn when you're japing, don't you?"

Sansa gave a little pout and shrugged, voice shameless: "It suits."

"Aye, it does..."

He let her go, by inches, so she slid from his grasp and felt his fingers caress her sides as she went back to her bed. She sat on the edge of it and as he began to turn she let the thought burst from her mouth without going through her brain-

"You could share the bed," she said, and his foot actually stalled in mid-air, making her stifle a giggle. "Um, you could place your swords on the ground and... it would be more comfortable than the chair. It's just an idea..."

 

++++++++++

 

All his manhood, he'd buried whatever hopes he'd had for happiness outside of the simple, savage satisfaction of an enemy slain and a battle won. His life was a straight red road to the Stranger, and Sandor had long since made peace with that fatalistic prophecy. His monstrous form had started it, long ago, courtesy of his brother, and his training had only hardened that resolve. 

No succor save for wine and battle. No elease save for whores paid well to endure his hideousness, or his hand when they couldn't be found. Night after night, year after year, and he'd grown so hard and cruel he'd forgotten the boy that had japed with his sister and looked up to his brother and, yes, even loved his unsmiling, uncaring father. 

But there were glimpses. When he saw a man and woman in happiness not bought or forced, he felt something stir that he no longer recognized. But he would stare, and watch, and study, until they moved away or became away that the frightening man was glaring their way and scurried off.

Sandor knew now, as she offered her simple sanctuary, that he wanted to know...

_To know how it feels to wake up next to someone, who would be there for your waking and not flee from the sight of you. Who wouldn't hurry to pull on her skirts and grab her coin and vanish forever. Whose eyes would flutter open and no, she would embrace you and smile and you wouldn't feel so alone in a cold world._

Sandor swallowed hard and shook his head. "Not tonight, little bird. I fear I will sleep too deep, and the dawn will come shortly to us," he spoke lowly and stepped forward, forestalling her disappointment, or so he hoped, with his hand on her shoulder and his lips pressed to her cheek. Her tiny gasp tickled the ruin of his ear and gods above, he actually felt something tingle there, in the midst of that dead, useless flesh. "Another time."

It was warning, promise and placation, all at once. But when he stepped back and took her in, she saw a satisfaction in her eyes. She had gentled him, and she was content to have done so.

_Because she wants the best for you. Because the foolish girl loves you._

Sandor settled into the high-backed chair after putting his bastard back to rights next to him. He watched her burrow under her covers and smiled as her formless lump wiggled and jiggled into position until her crown of messy red hair was once again on her pillow. He reached over and threw another log on the fire, feeling the chill creep into his breeches from the door.

"G'night, Sansa."

"Sleep well, Sandor."

She said it like she meant it, as she always did, and praise be to whatever fancy you prayed to, soon Sandor's head drooped and he was snoring softly next to the dancing flames.


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'mma try character headings when the POV changes. Might make it a bit more accessible, as has been suggested before, and I'll be throwing more POVs in as the story goes (oh, so many ideas...) so it seems a good idea.
> 
> Apologies for the last chapter: upon immediate reflection, it was a-LOT more overwrought than I originally intended. I'll be taking the Red Pen Of Editing Doom to it shortly. Here's hoping a few days of furi'us thinkin' can move this one along...

**WYLIS**

Wylis doesn't notice the cold until he sees other men doing so. Stamping feet and furiously rubbing hands, jets of steamy breath in the air, even from men swaddled in furs against the biting chill. He frowns a little and breaths in, gets those shards of ice in his throat that only arrive when real, bitter cold is on the way. Wylis remembers the last winter: not quite the snowy end of days that his septa used to terrify him with, but it was hard, and dark and people he cared for died. The same was coming now. Perhaps worse. 

The Lord of New Castle smiled anyway. He felt _alive_ , for the first time since he'd limped back from Harrenhal. He never thought he'd feel the thrill, the flame of anticipation of battle again. Gregor had stripped so much from him that he'd resigned himself to ever plotting from the shadows, not fit to lead men in the field again, but now...

Because of a slip of a girl with a name men will follow. The gods have a strange sense of humor.

"Ser Oprey?" He said to the man next to him, busy trying to keep his teeth from chattering. "Have you seen Lady Stark?"

"D-Down in the godswood, my lord," the knight managed to stammer out, leather armor and chainmail apparently not doing much good when it came to thermal dexterity. "One of the servants saw them earlier."

"Them?" Wylis waved the answer away before he heard it. "Of course, of course. Sword shield and all that..."

He didn't bother keeping the bitterness from his voice. The man Clegane was a menace, a child could see as much. He'd come inches from savaging two of _his_ household guard the night before, flying at them like a daemon and accusing them of... gods, Wylis didn't even know. He should have the man flogged, or at least banished from his castle. But while the dog was mad, he was also loyal. He never left Lady Stark's side, and no better guard could he think of. 

Wylis sniffed and felt tiny icicles form on his nostrils. _For the moment, anyway._

Wherever they were, he knew they had to hurry. The courtyard of New Castle was rapidly becoming a "standing room only" sort of environment. Three hundred horses and the men atop them were inside, lances stabbing at the grey clouds, armor shining wetly, liveries and banners from half a dozen houses emblazoned on them, but the green merman of Manderly was definitely the dominant. Behind and around them were a few score of mules and a handful of wagons, piled high with oats and feed and rations and all the necessities for an army on the move. Wylis smiled again at the thought, sitting a little straighter on Nightswift.

_Not quite that, but a good enough place for you to start, what?_

Another comforting thought. Wylis shifted on his saddle and Nightswift whinnied a little in complaint. The fat man chuckled and his cheeks were as apples, leaning forward to feed the courser a fresh apple from the bag at his knee.

"You'll have earned plenty of these," he said, voice a low whisper as he patted a farm, furry flank. "Having my arse spread across your back all day..."

Then the commotion started. Small, at first, to Wylis' eyes. A few heads turning in the same direction; nudges to others, slowing rising voices like the wind picking up speed. But it spread like a pox of features, like ripples in water, and the lords at the gate were soon all looking the same way as their men. Wylis frowned by even from his steed, could not see clearly...

Until the horsemen began to pull their horses back, like a sea parting, and Wylis could see the huge form in black armor, topped by a face half-incinerated and half-glowering.

Until he heard the words, repeated over and over, mingled love and disbelief and joy in simply being able to speak them again.

Lord Wylis smiled and shook his head. His father had a mind for schemes and secrecy, and it had worried him. Too close to the Boltons, and the southrons, always plotting in dark corners and rendering their fellows and allies into fodder for their ambitions. He did not want his father to go down that road. The one thing that swayed him was the simple fact it was not just for the son and brother they lost; not just for the betrayal. It was for the Starks, and that was all a Northman needed to hear.

"Lady Sansa... Lady Sansa... m'lady... Gods keep you, Lady Stark... m'lady..."

_They **are** the North_ , Wylis thought to himself as Sansa stopped before him and his sers, dressed in a short-hemmed grey robe fit for riding, but with her hood down. A morass of red hair tumbled and scattered down her shoulders and the wind played at it so every man staring thought her head aflame and their eyes were moths to it. 

"I'd have scarcely believed," he said, voice a murmur like he wasn't sure he was actually speak. "Until I saw it for myself."

"What would that be, my lord?"

Wylis' face split into a grin, and he was that portly, brazen man that had rode from White Harbor years before. 

"Another time, Lady Stark," he said, and then raised his voice so it could carry. "Are you ready to go home, my lady?"

"Aye!"

It came from her and him and the sers and the lords and the lowborn and the smallfolk on their donkeys and carts and it carried to the mute clouds and was spread by the whipping wind. 

 

**SANSA**

 

They walked through the godswood and she almost forgot they were in the midst of a prison, not a castle. Once they were within the Wolf's Den, the black walls had seemed oppressive, even watchful. Sansa could feel the centuries of loneliness and despair and gnawing madness seeping from them. Countless men who, rightly or wrongly, had been shackled and caged and forgotten. Or worse. 

Then she turned her eye to her constant companion. Riding next to her, watchful as always, frowning at every noise and face. Would he be treated thusly without her? Would anyone care about what he'd done for her? The kindness he'd shown? Or would they only see a monster? Would they be _wrong_ to? Sandor was hardly a man without innocent blood on his hands, and Sansa had seen too much to deny that. Did his _victims_ not deserve justice? 

She sighed and he glanced her way.

"Somethin' the matter?"

"Just thinking," she said, and smiled when she saw the thicket of approaching trees. "Nothing important."

The prison didn't so much vanish when they dismounted and entered, as much as it... became more vague. Part of the background. Sansa wondered at how anyone could put a godswood in a _prison_ , then remembered that long ago, the Wolf's Den was the castle for the Manderly's, before they built New Castle. Now it was a stockade and a crumbling one at that, falling rocks crashing to the ground booming out even as they walked. But as they walked and the elm and birch and oak grew thicker, the walls and granite blocks became faint. Choked by the untamed foliage, with every step she could feel more apart from the stones, the castle, the city...

"You're not one for the gods, are you?"

He didn't "hmm?" or grunt as she expected. He didn't stop, either, but kept pace with her as they walked through dried leaves and brittle twigs. 

"No."

Sansa turned at that simple word. Other men would have yoked excuses and philosophy to it; not Sandor. She asked, he answered and gave her nothing more. 

"You think it's just us? Just... all this?"

Sandor regarded her quietly for a while, seeming to weigh the truth of his mind against the risk of hurting her. She couldn't have imagined it was the fact they were in a "sacred place" that bothered him. Finally his lips twisted a little and he shook his head, eyes roving from her to a tangle of elm and birch, joined by an industrious invasion of ivy. 

"I know what I've seen," he said, and they stopped walking. "I've seen a man killed by my own hand brought back to life by the words of a priest. I've..." His eyes glazed and he was back in memory, but he frowned, as if he doubted it even as it recounted before them. Sansa rubbed her hands together in the cold air. "... I've heard strange things. Voices. But none of it has convinced me that there are gods who care for us. Care _about_ us."

She smiled and stroked his cheek. They were alone in the godswood, no guards to watch them and no prisoners capable or piercing with eyes the vast briar patch of fallen stone and turgid trees. He did not break from his touch, and she quietly marveled at that. He bowed his head a touch, letting his lank locks brush the back of her hand as they fell over his burned side. 

"I still don't know why you do that."

"Because they don't bother me," she said quietly, and his eyes flashed with that old, cynical suspicion she had first learned from him. Then they softened and rolled instead. 

"You're becoming daft, woman."

"Not 'girl' anymore?"

"You'd scold, for one, and it's too early for that," he said with a half-smirk and she patted his chest, the two of them walking again, winding deeper towards a vague and towering mass. "For another, no-one likes touching a man's scars. Especially mine."

"I'm touching _you_ ," she said, and stressed the word that he might finally get that through his thick, stubborn skull. "Your scars are _part_ of what you are. I'm not afraid of them-"

"Do you _like_ looking at them?"

Some growl crept into his voice, but it was the question that stopped her feet. Her mouth worked for a moment and with every moment she delayed, she saw the humor leak from his eyes. Finally she threw her mind away and just spoke. Better that way, with a man who could sniff out a lie like... well, a dog.

"No. I don't _like_ looking at them. But they're _attached_ to you, so I accept them." Her finger snapped up sharply as his mouth opened. Oh, she knew him too well to be drawn into that trap. "And _don't_ utter any nonsense about me wishing you were some handsome knight or a white bloody charger. I've had my _fill_ of knights. I'd rather have you." Blood rushed to her face and her eyes dropped for a moment and, yes, when they rose again, there was the start of a smug smile on his face. "I wish you were spared your pain. I wish you hadn't suffered so cruelly, at the hands of one who should have loved you. But wishing doesn't make it so."

She didn't want his retort, or his quips, nor that morning. They had only an hour or so before the mustered regiment of mounted troops would be ready to move, and they could waste no light, with the days growing so short. Besides which, speed as essential, and the snow would slow them enough. Sansa's mind was a whirl of all that could go wrong, and the cost of them going right. Sandor had been his usual methodical self, packing up his handful of belongings in a quarter-hour and then waiting on her. 

Fortune had seen her to a grey robe, the colors of her house, and Sansa had seen it as a sign when the maid bought it to her. Fitting, that she should wear them when she returned home.

She stood on her tiptoes, wobbling a little as she planted a chaste kiss on his cheek. The angry red tissue under her lips was rough and contoured like untreated leather, full of bumps and grooves. There was a queer sheen to it, a taste that made her vaguely queasy... but when she pulled back and saw his wide eyes, she smiled and she didn't need to force it. 

"Now... we came here for a reason, didn't we?"

She smiled all the wider as it was Sandor's turn to work his mouth like a dying fish, until-

-he planted one likewise on her forehead, making her giggle and her face tingle as the frigid air warred with her flushing cheeks.

"Lead on, m'lady."

 

**SANDOR**

He did not know what they were, or what they would be. All he knew was where they were going, and that was enough for now. 

Sandor had to grit his teeth and force his mind and eyes to act in accord during their short, leisurely ride to the Wolf's Den. His actions the night before, the fractured way his mind had whirled from weakness to madness to rage and vulnerability... it was too much. Sandor Clegane was as much known for his stone heart as he was for his fearsome scars and terrible skill. Where had that been that night? Where had been his resolve, his... his...

_Balls. You acted like a bloody woman, and she had to-_

The big man bit down before his mind could reach full froth, unleash that raging voice that would spew the same old words and the same tired, hateful feelings. He had more to worry about now than his own self-pity, and helping Sansa from down from her horse, that brief moment when the front of her body pressed against his as he did, and for a moment his eyes were her hair and his nostrils the scent of soap and lavender... they reminded him well enough.

But no more than her eyes. Her smile was bashful, but her eyes gave her away, and Sandor kept his mind sublimely _blank_ , with no little effort. Warm and hopeful and alluring, and Sandor knew she was becoming acutely aware of that. They wandered into the godswood and he kept one hand on his bastard; he knew the kind of men who'd use a holy place as the perfect scene to strike a target with their guard down. He was one, after all.

She spoke and he answered. She kissed him... and he answered that as well. The voice had no comment, or if it did, he ignored it.

Tired. That word summarized him perfectly, in heart if not body. He'd been second-guessing and riddling his own feelings for too long, and they'd left him frayed and brittle and on the edge of murdering two of Wylis' personal guards. Hardly exemplary behavior for a sworn shield.

And gods above, he was actually caring about that now. Not just her, making sure she was safe and protected, but-

Sandor lost himself in front of the massive tree, wide around as a cart was broad, branches thick as his arm curling upward but also punching, pushing through windows and even stone wall. Centuries of patient, insistent pressure, and not even bricks and mortar were a barrier to the weirwood. A riot of yellow and orange and red was splashed on every limb, a dozen artists given mushrooms and brushes and free rein. She sat in front of the face carved into it, crudely done but eerily real. One couldn't help but think that when you whispered to it, those wooden lips would whisper back.

But as his liegewoman whispered softly, her sworn shield was remembering. Further back than he'd dared before, when wine and slaughter had sated and buried all reminiscences. Here, though, in the presence of gods he cared not a fig for, with a woman he scarce dared to feel for, in the skin of a man growing more alien to him by the day... Sandor remembered, and did not fear the shades of the past.

A girl with his father's eyes and, he assumed, his mother's hair, mouth open in wonder as little fingers stabbed at the picture book. The boy he'd been, explaining the heroic fresco, the chiselled knight in golden armor standing between his maiden and a sea of dark and grasping enemies. She'd rested her cheeks on her hands as she lay on her belly and it pulled her mouth up and he laughed. 

Sandor closed his eyes. Oh, yes. He'd laughed. He never thought he would again, after what Gregor did to him... but she proved him wrong. There she was again, creeping into the room he'd barely left, up to the bed that had become his whole world... with one of her books. Smiling gingerly at him with tears in her eyes at what her brother - her _own brother_ \- had done to her other one. He'd yelled at her to leave, shouted until he was coarse, but she'd not be moved, actually stamped a foot down, sending her nightshirt shivering around her.

"No. You're my big brother and I'm staying."

"Sandor?"

He breathed in sharply and his exhale was ragged, tufts of cold air fogging around him. Gods, he'd felt that place again. The sparse heat from the fire; the itchy wool covers because his father was too cheap to buy fresh linen; the smell of burnt flesh ever in his nose; her eyes, her hair, every curve and groove of her lovely face. Now another one was staring at him, with leaves tumbling around her and her head cocked curiously.

"... hmm?"

"Who is Annalyn?"

Sandor's heart dropped into his guts. "How do you know that name?"

"You just said it. You whispered it, while you were looking..." He checked overhear shoulder and saw naught but the weirwood. "... over there. It seemed as if you were far away."

He grunted morosely and his lips curled bitter and slow. "Aye. Far away. Long ago."

"Who was she?"

It was a while before he answered, still looking at the carpet of fallen, shattered leaves. "My sister."

No reply. He looked up and saw calculation in her eyes, but he did not bristle at it. Sansa calculated much, and had learned to lever men when she had to... but it was always out of necessity, and she had never tried with him. When she weighed her words, she did so to spare him. 

"Is... What happened to her?"

Sandor's eyes turned hard and flat and his jaw tightened as if it were made of steel.

"Gregor."

That somewhat dampened the conversation. Sansa looked around as if studying every root and branch, searching instead for another subject. Sandor just stared at her, taking her in, wondering if she would ever understand-

Of course she does. She saw her father murdered. She had her family scattered and slaughtered, and couldn't save them. She lived a lie for so long she almost believed it. And her suffering is not over.

"Last night, with the lords," she said finally, voice taking on the measured tone he'd come to recognize from her when she was thinking of the game she was forced to play. "You said what would happen if Bolton won at Winterfell. Against Stannis."

"Aye, I remember well enough."

"He would then come here, to revenge himself on House Manderly for their betrayal."

Sandor didn't detect a question at the end of her words, and he smirked grimly. She was learning the ways of high-fucking-born men, or at least the more reptilian ones like the Boltons and their Frey stooges. 

"Aye. Probably after doing away with the fat lord's father, or keeping him as hostage." He breathed in sharply. A dog will not lie to you. So strange how a single sentence he spat at her years before, could become the bedrock of how he treated her now. "Then he'd track you down and probably marry you to some useful lord of him, and keep your brother as a..." 

He wanted to say "hostage", but if the merest fraction of what he'd heard about Ramsay Bolton was true, "pet" would be more accurate, and far more gentle.

"I understand."

Her voice was low and Sandor wished anew that he could soften his words... but that would not aid her. She needed the truth, and in days like those, a man who would speak brutal truth to you no matter what was as good as a dozen swords. She gazed back at the weirwood and spoke again without turning, gust of wind sending her hair waving coyly at him.

"And if Stannis wins?"

"Then Bolton will become extinct. The Freys might be able to wriggle their way out of it, escape back to the Riverlands" he said with distaste, "They seem good at that. Then the Dreadfort would be laid to siege, if Ramsay didn't already flee. And you would..." He stumbled over his words, but ground them out anyway. "... and you would bend the knee."

She looked sharply at him, eyes flashing like a scorned woman's, not a prickly girl's. "You think I... should?"

"Aye. Stannis wants the Seven Kingdoms, girl. Not five, not six, not eight. Seven. That means the North, and that implacable bastard wouldn't part with it even if you could give him an army. He needs you, though, so he'll be a little easier to treat with... but he won't stand for you trying any of that King in The North-"

"Queen. And I have no desire to follow Robb down that road," she said, quietly but firmly, running her hand briefly over the weirwood face, caressing the outlines millenia old. "I want Winterfell. I want Starks to live in it again. If I can get that back as a queen, so be it... but if I can _keep it_ as Warden of The North, even better."

Sandor wanted to leave it at that. She seemed to want the same, but his duty was not yet done. He stepped forward and she turned as he loomed over her, eyes softening a little as he attempted a gentle smile. It seemed to work.

"Until your brother is of age, any road. He'll need you."

She gave a watery smile and nodded at the way he spoke with such certainty, as if Rickon were already heading home. She'd used the same tone only two nights before, and now he mirrored it. Sandor's smile twisted up at one corner. She wasn't the only one who knew to pay attention. 

Sansa sighed and embraced him around the chest, arms warm and soft even through his armor. She turned her head to press against his heart, as if listening to it beat. Sandor didn't stiffen or hiss or clear his throat; he wrapped his arms around her shoulders and resting his chin on hers. She felt so fragile to him, like some automata used too long and in danger of cracking apart. She made no move to kiss him, just breathed against his body and he could feel the push and withdrawal of her breasts against him... and only then did he close his eyes and just-

_Enjoy it. While it lasts._  

"We need to go, Sansa."

"I know," she said in a voice that broke on the second word, but rallied by the time she spoke again. "I wish we could stay."

"No, girl, no," Sandor said in a voice low and just for her. He lifted her head from his chest and cupped her cheek with one massive, gauntlet-covered hand, running his thumb over her glowing cheek and smiling as much at the fact that he could do so without seeing fear in her eyes. Only the second woman to ever favor him so. "I know you want to go home. Just not this way. But home is where you're going, Sansa."

She gazed at him for a moment's worth of lifetime, then her arms fluttered up to his head in a whirl of grey linen and her hands were at his cheeks pulling him down and-

Leaves fell around them still but his ears did not hear them. He felt her lips against his and it was not the urgent, quieting thing of the night, when he'd sought to give her balm as much let his affections be known. Her tongue swiped gently against his lips, begging entry, and he opened them without his mind screaming at him to stop.

Enough doubts and fears. She wanted him, and he wanted her, and if he couldn't at least _try_...

His hand slid to the back of her hair and without seeming to follow the motion, he tugged his gauntlet off so he could bury his open palm in her hair and pull her in closer. He wanted to feel every hair caress his palm and his fingers, so he might commit their touch to memory. Their tongues warred and danced and when she groaned into his mouth Sandor felt a shudder go all the way through him and he advanced against her bold defence. She tilted her head and he dared not open his eyes, fearing she was some drunken fantasy and he'd wake up alone and unwanted, as he'd always been.

But she was not. She was warm and wet and breathing his air as he did hers. Moments passed. Or seasons. He didn't know, nor care. But eventually the kiss ended and it ended in its own sweet damn time: probably when both of them needed to come up for air. Her lips were puffy and swollen and she bit the bottom one and Sandor thought she'd never looked more beautiful, under the thousand eyes of her gods. Her face was flushed and he wondered how his own looked. Probably like some green squire stealing a kiss from a chambermaid, not a landless, title-less warrior with his arms around an heir to Winterfell.

She purred low and a hundred sweat-laden fantasies rushed through his head at once, making his head swim. She brushed her nose against his and he almost choked at the intimate little gesture, the way she seemed to be rubbing a soft little icecube against him.

"You're not bad at that."

"That so?"

She shrugged, a mummer's farce of insouciant opinion: "Could be better, I think."

Sandor growled low in his throat and his smile showed teeth, enough to give her the idea that he might sink them into her with their next embrace. The way her eyes widened and her mouth parted just a little told him the idea had found willing root.

"Enough of your sharp tongue, m'lady. We've business at Winterfell."


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sources (stop sniggering, I actually liked this research!):  
> -http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/army/medieval_logistics.htm  
> Found this cracking little page when I was looking for some tips and info on a Medieval army on the march... and fuck me if this bugger didn't deliver a banquet as instead of a few snacks. Heartily recommended to anyone with an interest!

**SANDOR**

"Muh-My lord, I don't understand-"

"What did I tell you about calling me 'lord'?"

"You said I couldn't call you '' _ser_ ', not-"

"Well add it to the list. No fucking lord, bo sodding ser, no buggering titles, boy."

The boy in question pursed his lips and his eyes flashed for a moment, but he held himself back. Sandor's own narrowed a touch and one corner of his mouth twitched.

_He can look you in the eye. He wants to be angry, but knows better than to poke a growling bear. Smart lad. Here's hoping he doesn't die with his guts in his hands a few days from now._

"What do I call you, then?"

Sandor snorted and Stranger mimicked his master, the pair of them cantering at a steady pace in the vanguard of their little army. Though, to Sandor's eyes, it wasn't so small once you took it all in account. He'd wager two or three servants and pages for every man horsed and armed, ready to do the actual dying. A thousand men, or thereabouts, and all of them moving at the pace of the slowest, heaviest wagon. In his youth he'd growled and gnashed his teeth at such weary, plodding progress, when he and Stranger were fit to ride rampant and engage their enemies; then he'd grown, learned some modicum of patience and understood that no matter how slow or fast they moved, death and butchery would be waiting for them. 

Now, though, he _was_ restless. He _was_ eager. He wanted this war... over? Yes, but... more immediate than that. Decided. Fought. Those that would harm them dead and rotting and their own fellows broken in the same way. And as was so often the way of his current days, Sandor found that his reasons were no longer just his own.

"Clegane," he said, resting his eyes on the hooded figure in grey cloth and furs of white and black in front of him. "That'll do, boy."

Niall's pony trembled under him and skittered to the side and the big scarred warrior didn't bother hiding his smirk when the cart boy swore and jerked the reins until the spry little beast toed the line. A horseman to his side scowled and Niall looked away, to the muddy, frozen ground... then back at Sandor. 

"Then, _Clegane_ ," he said, drawing out the word, his own petulant revenge that fell pitifully short of its mark. "What am I _doing here?_ "

Sandor gave him a smile that started as a smirk then split his lips to reveal a grin, eyes glittering like Niall's face was but a mirror to his soul... and his secrets. 

"I think you know things that can be helpful where we're goin'."

"Winterfell?" Niall's face scrunched up around his nose in confusion. Sandor just smiled wider. _Not bad._ "Only been there a few times. Lived me whole life in White Harbor."

Sandor decided to play along, taking an extra moment to sweep his gaze in front of the column again. He knew there were foragers and scouts and outriders, but it didn't matter. He couldn't be sure unless his own eyes had taken in his surroundings, and hers.

_What fucking little of it there is._

Sandor thought the Starks might need to change the family motto: Winter had most definitely _come_ , and brought the family with it. Snow drifted lazily from the leaden skies, but Sandor could see the thicker, darker clouds on the horizon held more violence in them. The ground was shapeless white in all directions, apart from the silver slash of the White Knife, their route to Winterfell. Even that thick expanse was being nibbled by ice, great sheets of it jutting out from the shore. 

The farms they'd passed were deserted, of all possible life. Men, women, children, animals, even crops... it was all gone. All moved on to White Harbor or-

_No. Not Winterfell. Not anymore._

"Aye, and I'm sure you know things," he said easily, squinting just barely as another fresh gust of ice smacked into them. "Things ordinary travelers might not, if you catch my meaning."

Niall stolidly shook his head and concentrated on pulling his borrowed cloak tighter around his shoulders. "Dunno about that, Clegane. Drive a veg cart, dun'I? Move the nag here, move it there, move it back... I get lucky, might 'ave a skin of wine t'keep me warm or..." His eyes flickered to Sandor's and the warrior stared back. "Some... more lively company, aye? Winterfell had some good 'uns, far as that went, tell y'that. This one girl... what's funny?"

Sandor was chuckling low and dark in the back of his throat, shaking his head as he looked away from Niall. "You're more than fair at it, I'll give y'that, lad."

"At what?"

"Lying," Sandor said, without a hint of rancor in his voice or his smile... but his eyes were serpentine when they flicked back to Niall. "But I wouldn't try it anymore with me."

He could see the boy wrestling with the classic dilemma: to plow on with the lie and hope Sandor would believe him in the face of the threat, or come clean. He'd seen The Look plenty of times throughout his life, and in his experience, the smart ones-

"What gave me away?"

Niall the Carter became something a little more in the space it took for him to say those words. His eyes seemed to lose their wide-eyed sheen and closed slightly, becoming colder and almost cynical. He gave a defeated little half-smirk and sucked on his teeth, shaking his head as if reprimanding himself. 

"That night you got us into the castle. The lie fell too easily from your lips, lad. No fear, no hesitation, and lots of little hints. The yawn. The grousing about yer lord," Sandor said, fixing a cold gaze onto Niall until he dropped his eyes. "And the way you knew to hide me when my boot was about to give me away. Very quick. Very sharp. Like you'd done it before. So, Niall... what do you _usually_ hide under your potatoes?"

The carter's eyes flickered around and he lowered his voice, keeping their conversation in the air between them. 

"Just grog and wine, I swear on the gods. Fucking Revenue's bleedin' us dry and the Manderly's are fair, aye, but still-"

Sandor help up a hand before the inevitable begging for him not tell anyone reared its embarrassing head. "Lad, I don't give a frozen shite about yer fuckin' smuggling. I give one about what you know about Winterfell. Namely, the things lawful folk _wouldn't_."

Niall studied that brutal, ruined face for quite a while, and Sandor silently congratulated himself a second time. Wheels were turning in that young head housing an older mind. But he saw more than just a criminal sharpness to it; he saw what he'd been hoping for. The thrill of a challenge. The call of danger. Sandor would have sneered at such youthful eagerness before, seen it as a fast way to die. He'd seen a darker twin to it, years before, in the grey eyes of a younger girl. 

Another memory he'd buried, now resurrected. He found himself hoping those dead grey eyes had found some life, far from there and safe. 

But Niall was the one in front of him now. Older by a few years than the wolfgirl, probably without blood on his hands either, but still... the same fire there. The same daring just waiting to be given the chance to shine and, gods help them, he appeared to have a brain behind it.

"Like ways _in_."

"Aye, lad. Now d'ya understand?"

 

**NIALL**

"Your Majesty, I don't... I don't understand this."

"You are not the only one, Ser Niall."

 _She looks terrible_ , he thinks, viewing her as he does with eyes that see more than most who know her. She wore her mask of queenly calm like a funeral veil, hiding behind it. Her voice was as lifeless as the stones that built the Great Hall of Winterfell, hung with banners and tapestries since the castle was first constructed. A half-score of plainly-dressed guards were scattered around the room, but there was no court or nobility. She had wanted to speak with him personally, even if it was from her throne.

Niall's gaze flicked back to the blank spot at her right shoulder. For ten years had always known what would be there. It had become so common a sight that people almost stopped noticing, and only when it was altered did they feel unease, like music you grow so accustomed to that you only mourn when it stops. Niall knew, with certainty and no small measure of feeling, that Sandor Clegane _should_ have been watching over his Queen, grizzled and stony as a carved _guhlom_ the wildlings told tales of, towering as a young bear and fierce as an old one. 

But he was not. He was gone and as much as the young knight tried, he could not believe it. 

"But... He would send word, some sign, a message," he said, words coming out more desperate than he would have liked. She saw his Queen's eye twitch subtly, another in her mouth, as if in sympathy. "Your Majesty, he would _not_ abandon you."

The Queen in The North tightened her grip on the arms of her throne; Niall heard the merest scrape of her nails along it, and resisted the urge to shift on his feet as eyes as cold as the Winter they'd barely survived bored into him. Anger, there. Simmering and under control, serving to leash the grief that was even greater beneath it. Her eyes looked down for a moment and Niall bowed his head. 

A dance with no music, but they knew the steps. 

A conversation with no words, but they both knew the questions and the answers. 

"But he has," she said, and Niall found his hands clenching into fists.

How... How dare he?! After all they sacrificed?! To endure for ten years, helping her restore her kingdom after it was nearly swept away under war and ice and daemons... marshalling and guiding _him_ through a station he never expected to have, advising him at his new command, becoming his friends, gods-damn-it-all, and this was how he decided to end it?! 

Niall swallowed hard. The past was done. He was gone. He was not coming back, and they had neither the time nor the money to scour a city thousands of miles away for him. 

He looked up with his one remaining eye and raised his head high, shoulders back, jaw set. _A true fucking knight_ , as Sandor would have said, but there would be something in his eyes when he did. Something close to pride.

_Gods damn you, Sandor. Why?_

"How can I serve you, Your Majesty?

"I will be needing a replacement Captain of The Guards," Queen Sansa said eventually, her own throat pulsing a little as she found her voice again. "Sandor trained you since we rode out of White Harbor ten years ago. I'll not waste both our time detailing all he must have taught you, and your bravery during the wars-"

She smiled again, that fluttering, bow-shaped thing that made men's breath stall, even and especially as she'd grown to woman. But this was one of memory; of memoriam. She knew how he had come by his scars, both visible and hidden. She knew much about him, and he of her. 

And Sandor.

"-is still talked about in the kingdom."

Niall couldn't help the smug little smirk; he tried to bow his head as if to hide it, but it only drew more attention... and he was rewarded with her own head tilting, eyes hard but smile intact, silently chiding his false modesty. 

"Oh, I wouldn't say _that_ , Your Majesty..."

"Regardless," she said, with an amused edge to her voice. "I will have need of you. Do you accept the appointment?"

Niall didn't answer right away; he usually didn't. He rolled his shoulders in his chainmail and felt old pains and faded scars stretch and grumble under it it. Barely seven and twenty and already a hard life gnawed at him... but didn't Sandor have it even worse by that age? He rested a hand on his sword as he thought, wondering about his keep and his wife and their girls, what Ely would say about his new duty if he accepted. If he _could_ do it, in the first place, and who better to-

His eyes slide to the figure on Sansa's left. Almost equal to Sandor in size, made all the more striking in her sex.

"Your Majesty, would not the Lady of Tarth be equally as suited, if not more? She has been your sworn shield-"

"And Brienne will continue to be, Ser Niall. I had two shields; now I have but the one. I would not appoint her to position that would rob my presence of her."

Niall took in the warrior-women from the far South, hair like tawny straw and eyes like sapphires. Her face was worn and scarred by hard years but those eyes... they still gleamed, jeweled daggers that never lost their keenness. The joke around the garrison was that when Clegane and Brienne sparred in the yard, the young pups would get to see the giants again. Now she kept her face immobile... but Niall caught the slight shifting of her lower jaw, then the way she tilted her chin a little higher, as if-

_Supporting herself. Reassuring. I ever see you again, Clegane, I'll rip your selfish balls off._

"Then I humbly accept, Your Majesty," he said, taking a step towards the throne and dropping to one knee. The Queen stood and her grey-and-white dress sighed as she moved, hands folded and pointed downward as she walked. Niall inhaled and smelled lavender and blackberries, a scent all of her own, he'd noticed. She stopped and he looked up, seeing the grey, broad banner of House Stark growling at the roof above her head.

"Thank you, Niall," she said in a small voice, and he was talking to Sansa from the stables again. He shook his head minutely and gave her a wink and a sad smile, just to let her know...

"Whatever I can do, Lady Sansa. I owe you that much. We all do."

 

**SANSA**

The fanfare and the high spirits didn't so much die when they left the Harbor as much as they were made very much aware of their realities.

Sansa thought of her stories from her childhood, a lifetime ago, when the smallfolk throw flowers in front of their horses as she rode next to Lord Wylis and his lords, at the head of a procession of thundering hooves and groaning cart wheels. People had cheered and waved and Sansa had waved back, amazed to see faces so aglow with affection and hope. But iron hooves striking sparks on cobbles had soon faded to mud as they reached the end of the city. Peddlers and beggars and travelers stopped and watched the serpent of men and animals and lashed wood pass, and some even waved... but none cheered. They were older men, for the most part. They knew that death followed Sansa and her men, either for them or their enemies.

_**Your** men? You mean Lord Wylis'? _

The thought struck Sansa again later that night, when the camp was struck and the sky had darkened without them ever seeing the Sun. Beyond White Harbor was a wasteland of ice and snow and Sansa knew that the foraging parties would come up with little when they joined them at their decided campsite, mayhap thirty miles from the port. She had to keep reminding herself she was not in command... at least-

_Not in name. But they do not march for the Manderly's._

"Lady Sansa?"

She blinked out the depths of her thoughts and looked up to see Ser Oprey, one of Wylis' knights, smiling over her with two steaming clay bowls in his hands. The aroma wafted over to her as she sat... though on reflection, "thudded" might have been more accurate. It was thick and strong and as she took one of the offered bowls, she noticed the stew didn't move very much. Peas and parsnips and carrots, all mixed together with dried beef and pork and broth. Soldier's stew, Sandor had called it. Quick and easy to make, and it stuck to your ribs a treat for a long march ahead. 

"Thank you, Ser."

"You're welcome, My Lady," he said, but he showed the smile for what it was when it slid off his face like a stone over ice when he turned to Sandor. "Only got two hands, Clegane. Didn't have an extra for you."

Sandor didn't even look up from his own work, tending their little fire into a bigger one. "I'm sure you'll fuckin' cry yourself to sleep over that tonight, old man."

"Mind your tone to your betters, boy."

Now Sandor looked up, face ugly and twisted by the firelight. "Point 'em out and I might. Or I might piss in their fucking faces."

"You-"

"Ser Oprey," Sansa said before the situation could deteriorate further, casting a quick glance at Sandor, who just grunted and went back to his fire. "How fared the foraging parties? They did not seem much changed from when they departed."

The old knight scowled and glared and seemed to be willing Sandor to rise again to his bait, give him an excuse for violence. But eventually he turned, wrinkled features smoothing a touch at Sansa's deflection.

"Yes... Yes, they were... sparse," he sighed and shrugged helplessly, stirring his bowl with a wooden spoon. "If this were Spring or Summer, mayhap the farmers and towns would provide for us, as we are no invaders. If not, the land would have game, crops, but now? The Winter has killed all that cannot run and sped flight in all that can. Thank the Seven we brought enough rations."

"For us _and_ the horses?"

Oprey barked a laugh and Sansa managed a smile, though it was more of relief than shared mirth. Good. A man was laughing, he wasn't thinking about killing another man right on front of her. She even broadened her own a touch, feeling bad for playing the old man, but...

"Sharp girl. Yes, indeed, Lady Stark. That's what most of the carts were for. The horses need about twenty pounds a day to keep them going, hay and oats. The men need a lot less, of course, but-"

"But they won't just run away if they don't get fed?"

She'd overstepped; she saw that in a moment. His good humor crumpled to a kind of injured outrage and Oprey shook his head firmly. "Lady Stark, no man here would desert you. We'd rather starve in the snow than run back to White Harbor."

Sansa knew how fine that sounded; the kind of death-or-glory steadfastness that heroes were made of and knights all aspired to. She also knew just how many square yards of sewage it was, more times than were fitting. High spirits and fanfare, oh, fine things... but in the wild, in the driving snow, without crowds to admire you or ladies to cheer, without a regular meal and on your way to battle? Stomach growling and the cold eating at you bit by bit, digit by digit? Then self-preservation tipped the scales against a man's invisible honor, and a soldier wondered about slipping away that night.

_All men have their limits. All men can break. These men might last longer, because I have... inspired them, I suppose. But they are still just men._

But she didn't say that. Instead she just bowed slightly and gave him the voice that Baelish liked to hear when she'd been short with him, or cleverer than he'd liked. 

"Ser Oprey, I am sorry. I jested, and it was in poor taste."

"Aye... well, not to worry, Lady Stark," the old knight said with a pat on her shoulder, pulling her cloak tighter as he did. Sansa was aware that Sandor had suddenly stopped poking the fire. "Bundle up tight tonight," said Oprey, casting a wry and knowing glance at the clouds that seemed so close and thick she could reach up and touch them, even on a moonless night lit only by torches and campfires. "I think it might snow..."

"Goodnight, Sir Oprey."

"Pleasant dreams, Lady Stark."

Sansa watched him leave and as soon as he'd wandered away from their tent, she heard the noise from the fire begin again. She rolled her eyes as she turned and found Sandor scowling at the flames. Gods, was he really jealous of a worn and lined old sack like Ser Oprey?

"He was showing his concern, Sandor," she said as she sat down next to him, leaning a shoulder into his playfully. "Making sure I was warm. Should I have been concerned? Would a gauntlet have been thrown down?"

"Don't go in for that knightly shite," he muttered savagely, finally turning a log over all the way and getting both sides burning nicely. "I'd just gut the cunt and be done with it."

Sansa sighed and frowned at his unflinching features. Words clearly weren't going to do it... so she looked around instead. At the camp around them, hundreds of tents either in rough, steepled rectangles of odd little triangles of leather and fur and linen, men crammed inside them already. Sandor told her that the men would be wanting to get as much warmth in them as possible before sleep, and that meant breathing, and lots of it, just to get the steam soaking into the fabric. Now Sansa craned her neck and looked carefully, seeing a few scattered handfuls of shadows drinking or crouching over their fires or bolting down soldier's stew. Niall (and gods knew she needed to ask about _that_ strange choice at some point) was already in his tent, having wolfed down his stew and knotted himself tight in the warm. So, around _them_...

The girl bit her lip and shuffled a little closer to her shield, smoothing down her cloak and just happening to flap an edge of it over where they met.

He stopped his fiddling with one hand when she wrapped her hand around the other. Just the feeling... the ability to hold some part of him and now be denied. And the way he looked at her a moment later, with wonder and disbelief and longing and more she could not name? Sansa swallowed and blew on her stew in her other hand, smiling as the hot steam rose from the food and caressed her frozen face. 

"I'll have half," she whispered to him, digging around with her spoon for a nice chunk of pork. "You can have the rest."

"No," he said as a reflex she'd been expecting. "You need-"

"Less, actually," she said around a mouthful of piping hot meat, mouth and lips doing an odd little back-and-forth as her tongue hurled the chunk around her mouth. "You heard... _kff_... what Ser Oprey said. Horses need twenty pounds, but men... I'd say five? Maybe three?"

"And since when did you become a scholar of marching armies?"

"Since this morning," she shot right back, eyebrow quirked and gods, she'd swear there was a flush on his unmarred cheek. "The point stands, though. Bigger animals need more food. So half will be enough for me, and the rest for you."

"Sansa, I can't-"

"Yes, you can, and yes, you're going to."

Her smile grew and flowered into a giggle as his expression turned almost helpless at her assault of words. Finally he threw his little stick into the fire and gave up with a wave of it. "Fine, fine... you win." 

Then his eyes flicked to hers, hidden under his locks of hair that were growing ever-longer, casting about them until he felt safe enough to-

-bring her hand up out from under the cloak, smooth and fast as he would a sword-

-and plant a kiss against her palm.

His eyes burned into hers as he did it, and Sansa gasped at the strange current that she felt in her hand. She was still getting used to the simple act of... touching, she supposed. Not just kissing - would she ever get used to that, with him? - but the intimacy of exploring each other. She realized with a blush in her cheeks that she'd devoted more nights to such wanton wanderings in her mind than was ladylike, but now the day had come in the flesh, she was ill-prepared.

_Then it is time to learn._

Sandor smiled, slow and wolfish, like he was reading her mind. Her eyes narrowed a touch and she ate quickly, until half the stew was left in the bowl and the other half was (eventually) making its way down to her stomach. As he took the bowl from her, her other hand came up and wrapped around his mitt, just as the first flakes began to fall. Not that it mattered much to them, and the heat between them as their eyes met across flickering light and looming shadow.

"Eat quickly."

 

**SANDOR**

_Fuck me._

_Yes, that's the **fucking** idea. _

Sandor almost choked on the last mouthful of stew as every lewd thought of what he'd long wanted to do with Sansa - _to_ Sansa - came rushing through his head at once. Clearly his mind would not make this easy on him that night. 

The snow was falling in soft sheets by the time she led him into their tent. And he _was_ led. He, ferocious and feared across the kingdoms, held by the hand of girl nearly half his age, and he felt his heart pounding in his head. The inside of their shelter was a mass of furs and covers, rations safely covered in a corner, but the rest of it designed for a single purpose: warmth. The fire from outside cast strange slits of light inside through the closed flap, and Sandor watched without voice as he watched her disrobe.

Glimpses. Tantalizing and raw and perfect by his eyes. Every item shed brought him closer, in body and mind, until she was down to her shift and he was close enough for her breath to fog in his face... and he felt her hands on him. Stripping his gauntlets, lifting his mail shirt over his head-

-and nearly falling over when she couldn't reach high enough, but his arms were there, around her waist.

Just a thin layer of fabric between his hands and everything he'd wanted in a woman. Soft and smooth, flawless despite all she had suffered, but it was the strength she saw in her eyes that told him she was far more than the girl he'd met years before. She'd stood before lords who favored caution and rode at the head of their army to take back her home. She'd survived Joffrey, and the Imp, and Littlefinger, and Cersei... who else could claim such things? 

Yet still, still her eyes shone. They were blue pools even in the twisting shadows, and he could have dived in them and never surfaced. His mouth worked dumbly as he struggled to find words, any kind of response to her... just her. He was so lost to her that he was running his hands over her from shoulder to waist and he pulled her closer, down to his breeches and undershirt and his boots.

She smiled and stroked his cheek. Fire and ice in her fingertips and at the latter he lowered them onto the furs. He smiled at a memory as he covered them both, until they were in their own dark cave of blankets. 

"What's funny?"

"Remember last time," he said in the darkness, voice a low growl and he felt goosebumps rise on her skin. "You were doing that to me. Making me warm."

"I remember," she said back, mouth so close he could feel the ghost of her lips on his own, "I remember what you told me, too."

Sandor shook his head at the recollection, at his foolishness, his harsh order to her, and the fact he'd been so blind. Here they were, bare weeks after that night, wet and shivering in a tiny hut, when she'd kissed him for the first time. The taste of her would never leave him, and he licked his lips now, mind finally vomiting an answer to the question he'd asked it since that night-

"Blackberries."

"What?"

He answered with his lips, not his voice. Sandor closed his eyes and let go of his past, as much as he could, and poured himself into her touch, her mouth, her hands, until he was pressed flush against her as they lay on their sides. Her leg snaked up and wrapped over his, ankle pressed under his arse and he moaned but did not leave her. Gods, he could taste more than just blackberries. The _need_ on her lips, her tongue, the way her gentle hands became firm and _insistent_ as they buried themselves in his hair, pulling him closer. 

Never before had a woman wanted him without expecting coin after. The sheer, cold force of that struck him even as he kissed her and Sandor felt himself drawing away, knowing there had to be a _reason_ for that-

"No."

She was breathless and caressing his face, eyes twin points of light in the darkness. 

"Please..."

"Sansa," he said, voice a croak and some wits slowly coming back to him. There was more than this tent and this night. There were consequences, in all their terrible forms. "We... Whatever you want from this-"

"I just want you-"

"And you think I _don't?_ "

"I know you do."

Where did that leave them, save for a stunted silence, each cradling the other's face? What more could they say, apart from the word they'd both been so studiously avoiding? What would matter? Sandor shook his head and breathed deeply, tried to forget the scent of her blinding him to the harsh truth of what they were.

"Sansa... I cannot take your maidenhead," he said as clearly as he could, grateful he couldn't look her in the eyes under day's harsh light. "When this is over, you will marry, and your husband-"

"And why can't that be you?" There was fire in her voice now, an old indignation he was familiar with now. Sansa's had been a pawn at best and chattel at work, over and over, and now she didn't have to submit to any man's authority. "Why can't I decide that now? My... My mother and father are gone." The words came out as a choke and out of instinct he held her closer, so she was almost speaking into his chest. "I want them back. I want to embrace them again, have father speak softly to me and mother scold me, but... but they won't come back. Neither will Robb or Bran or Arya. Only Rickon is left, and _he_ will not tell _me_ to marry some lord I have never met and do not... could not..."

_You are free now, little bird. But the cage will come back down. You just don't want to believe it._

"Sansa," he said, and it was barely above a whisper. "I can't."

She stiffened under his touch and Sandor would have ripped his tongue out in that moment if he could. It was more than a rejection to her, and he knew it: it was a betrayal. It was him saying that despite all she was, all she had become through tears and horror and suffering, she was still just a girl to be married off for a "good match". He leaned closer to her and she pulled away.

"But you would go so far as to hold me like this? As if we _were_ husband and wife?" 

Sandor could only take so much on the defensive; at her accusation his words became harder, a counter-attack in the face of her anger.

"Because I can't _not!_ Every time we look at each other, touch each other, you... I feel _whole_." Well, counter-attack had been the idea, anyway. But vitriol can only take a man so far. "I took... I took advantage of that. When we lie like this, when I kiss you-"

"But you won't go further? So I'm little more than a wh-"

He should have slapped a hand across her mouth. Instead he kissed her again, and the fire he tasted could have burned him all over again. She tried to pull away but that lasted only a moment. Soon she was sliding her tongue against his and digging her fingers into his shoulders, trying to punish him and arouse him at the same time it seemed. Their heads tilted and jerked and soon they were adrift again.

"Don't... _ever_..." When the broke again, he could only speak in rasped gasps, and his hands squeezed her with every word. "Call yourself that."

He spoke those words and he meant them, but they were still in the same quandry, and they both knew it. He could hear her sniffle and bite back tears and in a blink her carpet of red hair was under his chin and he was holding her. He wanted the world to go away. It had caused them nothing but pain, and much more awaited them. But Sandor had her for that night, and he wouldn't waste it.

He kissed her again. Softly, with care, mapping her lips with his own, until the tension leaked from her thin shoulders and she gasped against him. Emboldened, Sandor let his hands fall down and glide over the front of her shift. 

Sansa gasped again when he cupped one breast, and his teeth flashed in an ivory slash. Gods, but she had grown into herself. He kissed her again, ravenous, thumb swirling over the nub he found there until it was hard and every time he brushed against it she trembled. Her breath came out in fits and starts, little whimpers that she couldn't seem to control, stalled only when he kissed her. Then his lips trailed down her neck, chasing the pulse of her blood down her throat until he found that place where it beat loudest and he suckled at it.

"Sandor..."

He chuckled as her leg gripped him tighter, but the sound became strangled when it pushed him closer to her core. Already it was afire, he could feel it, and the wetness pooled between her legs. He swallowed and grit his teeth. He'd gone this far. He'd promised much, and while he would not take her maidenly virtue... there were other things.

"Turn around. Back to me."

His tone left no room for argument, and in a ruffle of blankets and her sliding skin against his, her arse was pressed against his hardness and gods, didn't that just make her moan louder? Sandor bent down his head and growled low in her ear, teeth nipping at the porcelain flesh between her neck and shoulder, as his hand reached around and moved down... down...

She bucked when it vanished under her shift and in a flail of red curls her head craned back-

-and his lips caught hers and Sandor's eyes popped open as she... she sucked at his tongue, all the wanton lust he never knew but always suspected bursting out of her in one go. Her hand gripped the back of his head, a fistful of hair held tight, forcing him to kiss longer, deeper, as his rough fingers went from cold and dry to warm and wet, stroking that glistening triangle of flesh he could not see and didn't give a damn if he couldn't, as long as he could feel it and feel the shudders his touch evoked. 

Every brush of his fingers bought a new tremor to her, and Sandor found himself feeding off her pleasure. The scattered whores he'd been with never needed such playfulness; they were stuck and tossed aside before his seed had even cooled on or in their bellies. But this... this was so much more. Intimate beyond that simple word, and though he was the one pleasuring, he found himself grinning wickedly against her lips.

"I love doing this to you," he said, proving his point by swiping his fingers from her inner thighs to the top of her slit. "That you want this from me, and I can give it to you."

She muttered something and he couldn't catch it, but when he drew away her voice was raw and hungry.

"More."

 

**SANSA**

She was submerged, and whenever the waves crashed against her, every inch tingled and sighed. Sansa had explored her own body before, but having another do it for her, with strong, knowing fingers and her hard, huge body pulsing around her... it was almost too much. Every time his fingers found her sex she rolled her hips against them, until they were between her folds and she had to mash her lips against him lest she cry out. Soon they were in a rhythm, her body rolling and bucking, matching the waves buffeting her and the stroke of his fingers until-

"There," she managed to gasp against him when his fingers found that spot just above her folds. "Right... there."

Sandor needed no urging. He may not have been a man with intimate experience of pleasing a woman, but he knew how to read them, or at least her. He knew the spot the moment she spoke, and Sansa felt tears in her eyes and a cry strangled in her throat as his fingers found it and pinched gently, rolled it between them... then past them, sliding deeper into her.

"I... Sandor..."

"Kiss me, little bird," he said, and she barely heard his words over her own breath, coming out in hot, ragged bursts as her body boiled closer, closer, closer. "Or you'll sing loud enough to wake the whole-"

Sansa kissed him and stole his words, free hand finding his and clasping it to her breast, anchoring her in place as she finally froze and every part of her ached and burst at once. He hadn't lied: she nearly screamed against him as the waves finally drowned her, overwhelmed her, and her vision swam and her senses vanished and she was panting and sweating and it mingled with his own and her thighs twitched under his fingers. Exhaustion settled over her like a wet, warm shroud and she was too blissful to fight it. She kissed him one final time and let all of it fall away, save for his heat warming her against the hissing wind from under the tent, and the sticky satisfaction between her legs

++++++++++

She awoke and realized that, yes, she _had_ been sleeping. Gods, had his touch _really_ stolen her waking hours? Her body felt sore, but in the way of a great exertion overcome, boneless and throbbing. At once she felt out for him and he was there, a block of warm, hard muscle... and Sansa smiled sleepily as she realized there was a reason she could see so little.

He'd planted himself in front of their flap. Anyone coming through would have to deal with him before they ever got to her.

Then she frowned. There was a... rubbing. Like wet leather or wool, pressing together in hard, slow movements. She shook away the delicious fog over her mind and found she could _feel_ the to and fro of them, as if they were-

Sansa blinked again and caught Sandor's wide eyes, looking over his shoulder. They traveled down and she could see his bare back gleaming with sweat, and the dark contours of his shoulders, the arm that was snaking down between his legs. He was on his side, but she needed no chart or map to know what he was holding, and the feral, lustful look in his eyes told her everything else.

_Well, this is hardly fair._

The memory of his fingers had her resurrected to he wits in a moment. She pressed herself against his back and slid her fingers over his arm, thick and hewn with muscle, tense with sweat and passion. The sky was beginning to lighten beyond the black of night, the hidden Sun striving to illuminate even as the clouds choked it, and she didn't need to imagine the look on his face when her fingers wrapped around his own... and what they were holding. 

Sansa moaned low in her throat and felt an answering shudder from him. She smirked and kissed the corner of his mouth, swiping her thumb over the tip of him and delighting as he thrust against even that fragile contact. She waited until his eyes were on her, hard grey now like liquid lead, molten and scorching and barely controlled. She spoke two words in a whisper, plea and order both.

"Don't. Stop."


	17. Chapter 17

**SANDOR**

She reached her peak by his hand and Sandor could do naught but gaze in wonder as she shuddered and sighed under him. For a moment she seemed to... shimmer, as if her body was caught between waking and dream. Then her lips pressed against him again, wet but smooth, and when she broke from him, her eyes were lidded, heavy... and then closed. He watched the rise and fall of her breasts, nipples thrusting through the fabric of her shift. Finally they slowed from a racing, breathless pace to peace. She fell from waking to sleep under his eyes, and the smile on her face was a secret known only to her gods. 

 _No_ , Sandor thought with a slow smile, hand stroking her matted hair. _Not just them._

Curious, how he did not think to satisfy himself in those long, thoughtful moments as he watched her. He felt only a quiet, burning pride that he, lowest of fucking low, had birthed that smile and that pleasure. His fat, hard fingers stroked her hair as if it were precious and fragile. He felt the sweat glistening in them, and it made them seem more real, more beautiful. Sandor settled behind her and breathed deep of her scent as he wrapped his arms around her stomach. Even in sleep, she moved against him, and he closed his eyes when her hand clutched at his from someplace beyond the real. 

But she _was_ asleep. There was no mistaking it. Sandor stared at her in the uneven light and felt things squirm and sigh inside him he'd sooner not face. But mayhap they were easier to face, if she was...

He frowned. She was there, but not there. Sandor had ever hated himself for his craven form at the Blackwater, scared from the battle by the wyrd flames like a green squire. He swore never to repeat that shame, and yet, he had shown his cowardice. Not in battle, with muscle and steel, but in his thoughts and words. No man he feared to face; not even Gregor, and he would always hold a grudge against the gods or fate or just the world in general for robbing him of the justice in slicing his square head from his ox shoulders. But this girl? He shirked from her... and now, in the heady aftermath of her caresses, Sandor finally found the words.

 _She will not hear, but they will be spoken_ , he thought to himself, and added with a gulp. _Until she **can** hear them._  

"I wanted you for what you were," he murmured, fearing her gasp as her sleep was proven counterfeit, but not daring to still his tongue. "Now..."

_Don't drag it out, idiot! She might wake up._

"Now I love you for what you are."

There was more. Once tapped, he felt as if there was a great well of pretty words that he would have sneered and laughed at years before, when he first met the doe-eyed girl who trembled at his face. His mouth moved silently, though. The night had been kind to him, in act and thought. He wouldn't be reciting a fucking bard's sodding commission to a sleeping woman. He would marshal his words, and treasure them, as he did her presence. So instead he left the words hanging in the air, and kissed her next to her ear, face creasing to a grin as she murmured his name softly. 

_She dreams of you. Fucking hells._

Sleep came soon and welcome to him. It was not oblivion, though, the usual void he longed for, bereft of harsh memories and rasping fears he buried during the day. He slept, and his last sensation was of her heart drumming through his own skin, and Sandor was content. 

++++++++++

Morning arrived and he was aware of her before he'd fully shucked off dream and aether. Her warmth seeped through his dreams and was there, stirring in his skin before his eyes had even creaked open. Sandor blinked away sleep and found a fresh phantasm waiting for him: Sansa Stark, deliciously unbound and unbridled in sleep, shift hanging off one shoulder, mouth partly open, face peaceful and flushed. He began his day with a smile, then remembered himself.

 _Not yet dawn_ , he thought as he turned to the flap, seeing the merest beginning of light though the tent flap, like the Sun's embers before it set the sky afire. _One... maybe to hours._

In past days, he would have grunted upright and stretched sore limbs, risen and began to batter his mind into line for the day ahead. Even after a few flagons sloshing around his stomach, Sandor Clegane had taken pride in being the first of the Kingsguard to rise, standing his guard when the others were still tugging on their gauntlets. Now he had a charge far more precious to him; a master he cared for, and took strength from, even if she was a woman. Sandor felt an ancient sting as he thought back to that smirking, giggling little creature who sat on the throne with him standing at his side. A monster even when he was a boy of six, just like Gregor, only without the strength of a raging bear. He had known, even then, what Joffrey would become. He'd seen whatever shreds of humanity he possessed ripped apart and discarded with glee, until only a madman worthy of Aerys was left. 

He'd failed him. He should have done more, but he didn't. He'd closed his mouth and his eyes and only ever done his damn duty, to the letter. And his duty was often to stand in silence as Sansa Stark was beaten with fist and sword flats until she was a mewling, bleeding mess. 

At the memory of it he clutched her tighter, only to curse himself when she moved... but no, she was still asleep. She turned from him, though, wiggling her toes in the midst of a woollen blanket at her feet. The sight of her banished those memories. Sandor rolled onto his back and stretched his arms over his head, exhaling with a slight wheeze as bones popped into joint and muscles found their strength again-

-then he realized there was one "muscle" already firmly at attention. 

He looked down and saw the bulge in his breeches, and fancied it had mayhap not diminished a jot since he'd fallen asleep. He smirked at the thought, then the memories gasping and turgid returned to him... and he rolled to his side with intent stamped on his face, hand sliding down to the buttons over his crotch. 

Sandor had taken himself to hand before, when whores weren't lurking, but the inspiration he'd conjured had always been... false. He'd fantasized of beautiful women, what he would do to them and they to him, and they would never blanch at his scars nor look away. But now there was fresh life in his motions as he gripped himself: he didn't need the lies anymore. Flashes and recollections of mere hours ago were still sizzling on his skin, and Sandor could bring them to his hand without having to force his imagination. _She_ had wanted him; _she_ had been so wet and willing and he felt not a dram of guilt in the picture his mind drew.

Her astride him, in that same tent but without an army surrounding them; alone for leagues in every direction. So she could moan and cry out as she impaled herself upon him, free of her shift, his eyes devouring her naked, swaying breasts even as his hands cupped them. The taste of her nipple, hard but sweet, as he lurched up to claim them, and he knew how soft and sopping her cunt was and-

Sandor froze as fingers not his own gripped him. His lust did likewise and he stiffened, wishing suddenly that he would _wake up_ , because this had to be a fucking nightmare... but if it was, why wasn't she horrified? If that were the case, why would she-

"San-"

"Don't. Stop."

_Fuck the gods..._

Want soaked her voice, not disgust or shock or even drowsiness. She whispered the words but they were almost firm as a bellowed order. Hesitation and real, honest _fear_ of her eyes judging him some beast slid from his muscles and he moved his hand again, up and down... carrying her own with it... and she did not shrink from him. She gripped tighter and he turned back his head, the very reverse of how they'd lain the night before.

Her lips captured his own before he could utter another syllable, and soon he felt her own fingers not just covering his own, but sliding over them, soft fingers unused to toil stroking the weeping head of his shaft. Sandor gasped and growled and bit her bottom lip. Their lusts only fed each other, for she simply gripped him harder, eyes snapping open at the brief, delicious nip of pain. Her eyes dripped desire and he kissed her again, the corners of her mouth, her chin, sinking his tongue deep into her mouth and rolling around her own, all the while his hand moving hard and with purpose, her own rubbing him at the tip until it was trembling and he felt a tightness between his legs, his body no longer submitting to his control and-

Sandor grunted and his cock flexed and with every spasm he breathed hard into her mouth as he kissed her, exhausted all over again and loosed of himself all at once. Fantasy didn't vanish that time; his climax was the end of nothing, but seemed more like the release of a beast. He cupped her face and kissed her hard and urgent until she had to pull away, cheeks red as apples and hair falling in her eyes. 

They lay for a while, gazing at each other in silence, their perfect bastion of furs and covers and tent hide in the midst of hundreds. Sandor closed his eyes and breathed out a heavy, whooshing breath through his mouth, chuckling lowly, almost giddy.

"That... I wasn't expecting it."

"Neither was I," she said with a knowing half-smile. "But I'm still glad I woke up."

Sandor shook his head and gasped a laugh and stroked her cheek, eyes studying her like that was their first time meeting.

"You're a bloody odd highborn lady, y'know that?" His voice grew harsh with mocking scorn, delivered with a wry smirk. "Such _wanton_ behaviour. Ain't that the word you use for wanting your hands on a man?"

She looked away and blushed yet more, if that were even possible, but met his gaze like the challenge it was. "Mayhap before. Not anymore. I've waited long enough."

The words came before he could stop them, and by her tiny frown she knew he was biting off some others. But Sandor let them slide from his lips anyway, as his thumb stroked her lip and she let him slip it inside, biting playfully. 

"So have I."

She smiled back with her eyes wide and loving, but then bit her lip, frowning as if pondering some worthy question. Her hand drifted to his drooping member and the glistening ropes of seed staining the blanket next to him. Her eyes fixed on them in a way that made Sandor howl inside with perverse hunger, she whispered in earnest inquiry. 

"What does... What does it taste like?"

Sandor grinned and felt himself stirring again, both at the question and the flash of need on her face. 

"Would you like to find o-"

His words died. She opened her mouth and he pressed his hand over it. Boots on frozen ground. More than one pair, and coming closer. Voices thick with urgency, here and there, and the crunch of boots became quicker, men running. Sandor's head snapped around and it seemed by glaring at the closed flap, he could somehow hear better. The camp was coming alive, and quickly. He'd been in enough to know that didn't happen unless a true tyrant was at the helm, or some looming threat put speed to it.

"Get dressed," he growled, banishing his own "wanton" thoughts and laying a hand on his sword, never more than two feet away from him, even through their forbidden night. "Sounds like trouble coming."

 

**WYLIS**

He knew that many of the men grumbled about the lack of whores in their meager supply train, but Wylis found himself not caring for paid affections. Oh, when he was a younger man, mayhap it might have mattered. A man of two-and-twenty, on the campaign trail, his blood up during the day and wine in his hand at night... one needed release. But now Wylis knew that unless it was Leona in his arms - stout and hardened and with her fleshy face and heart that loved him so much - he would find no satisfaction.

The Lord of New Castle slept with one of her favors wrapped around his pudgy hand, sprinkled with her favorite perfume. He smiled as he closed his eyes and inhaled it; he knew it was her favorite, because he bought it for her, before he left with King Robb. Leona wasn't one for soft southron fancies, but like most women, she had her guilty pleasures, and a fine scent was one of them. She still wore her furs and wool and drab Northern colors, and she loved them... but when he was near, he could smell Highgarden flowers on her flesh, and smile knowingly at her.  

"I will see you again, my love," he promised the favor in a whisper, eyes hardening as they found the top of his command tent again, remember all they had yet to accomplish. "But there is much to be done."

Galloping hooves shattered his thoughts of a somewhat sedate morning rise. They pounded and crashed over the hard earth and Wylis was on his feet within a few moments, sword in hand even as he stood at the tent entrance in just boots, breeches and nightshirt. The cold bit at him on every inch instantly, but the pounding blood under his skin kept him warm, and his eyes grew harsh as he saw-

The scouts. The mount of the man in the lead nearly reared back on its back legs, so fast did he pull back the reins, words stuttering and shooting out in desperation, face slathered in sweat despite the bitter morning chill.

Wylis' face grew from a mask of violent anticipation to something not quite more relaxed, but not so harsh, either. Contemplative. Oddly satisfied.

_Well, we knew we would stumble across a damn army at some point._

"Ser Oprey?" He said to the air, and of course the old knight was already at his side. His other lords were coming in one by one, awakened by the sounds of sudden, unexpected activity like the old campaigners they were. "Rouse the men and strike the camp, _at once_. I want to be moving again within one half-hour."

A tall order, but Oprey did not dispute it. He just nodded shortly and turned on his heel, moving quickly and loosing orders and shouts in all directions. Wylis dismissed the others with the same alacrity, leaving only his handful of bannerman to join him...

_No. Not in the tent, it needs to be struck. The ground will do._

"We," he said as he laid the map on the ground, fastening it with stones, "are... here."

He pointed at the fork the White Knife took at it worked its way into the North. One half of it meandered further north in a path that could never be called direct, finally ending at Long Lake. The other sprouted to the north-west, where it would kiss the side of Castle Cerwyn and then, above it just half a day's ride further, end at Winterfell. Wylis knew they were resting at the top of that fork now, ready to keep following the second fork until they found themselves before the Seat of The North. 

"Our scouts have just brought news that there is a large force, foot and horse, mayhap five leagues from here."

The same old warhorse that gave Sansa more due than his fellows stroked his white beard and immediately asked the pertinent question.

"Their banners?"

Wylis looked up and his eyes were grave. "Twin blue towers on a white canvas. Freys."

Breaths were sucked in sharply and looks of loathing were exchanged on every face. Wylis smiled grimly at their lack of fear. He'd yet to reach the intelligence to spawn it, but he suspected it would not matter. Undisguised hatred were on his bannerman's faces, coupled with antsy, fidgeting desire for movement. For action. For _vengeance_. Lord Walder had fed their beloved King and kin and friends his salt and bread and butchered them with Bolton like pigs. Any extension of his authority they could wreck, any blood they could spill to _hurt_ that decrepit cunt, they would take it.

"Their numbers?"

Wylis sighed and studied the map, hiding the concern in his eyes. "The scouts say mayhap thrice our own. Close to a thousand. But the scouts said they appeared bedraggled and many men were torn, with fresh dressings. They have few tents and I'd wager they will leave many corpses frozen in the snow this morning."

Lord Maysum grunted and when he nodded, his chainmail tinkled. "They must have engaged Stannis, but we know not who won. If they had, methinks they would not be so ragged... but if not, would they not retreat back to Winterfell? Or Castle Cerwyn?"

"Fair points," Wylis said, eyes fixed on the map and his fingers stroking it as if trying to divine wisdom from the lined parchment. "But I have only guesses for you. I believe they lost, such is their state, but their numbers are still enough to be a concern. As for their location..." He frowned at the simple black block that marked Castle Cerwyn; hardly fitting for so imposing a structure. "... mayhap the Cerwyn's were not as inviting as they're hoped. Mayhap, they turned away their defeated force and by that time, Stannis had blocked their path to Winterfell. So they flee the only direction they feel safe."

"To White Harbor?"

"Or the Neck," Wylis added, getting back to his feet with a low wheeze. "And their own lands."

"We could break them," said grizzled Lord Tyber, eyes those of an eager young knight's instead of a man who'd likely seen his last Winter in the present one. "A defeated force, without shelter, or food, wounded and freezing... their numbers would mean little, my lord. One solid charge from the heavy horse would scatter them-"

"And turn a single formation of men into bands of survivors foraging over our lands."

Tyber grunted and gave a nasty chuckle. Around them servants and horseman were pulling down tents and readying horses, but their bubble of strategic decision seemed oblivious. "Not fer long, lad. Not once Winter gets its teeth into them properly. Five days, maybe ten, and those we don't slaughter will be ice sticks by then."

Lord Wylis nodded, but to which opinion, he did not know. Both were solid and rational... but the fact remained, they could not avoid or make peace with such a force. Of all his allies, Bolton relied most upon the Freys, because of the treachery that bound them. Wylis didn't imagine for a moment Roose Bolton could force himself to "trust" anyone, but the Freys were his most reliable men, save his own and his Bastard's. They held no love for Northmen, either, and the sight of a much smaller force, even horsed, would only encourage them. 

 _Can't avoid them. Have to fight them. Hit them hard, a solid charge, break them quickly, then move on to Cerwyn as fast as possible, leaving them to injuries and frost,_ he shook his head as his eyes rose from the map, skimming along the solid ground. _Pray they don't have too many crossbowmen left._  

Then he saw womanly sandals on the ground, not the mailed boots or boiled leather shoes of his men. He straightened as he eyes traveled up, and a woman in a grey-black cloak was walking swiftly towards them, men skittering out of their way. _Or **his** way_ , he thought to himself, noting her hulking guardian marching just behind her, hand forever on the hilt of his blade. 

"Lady Stark," he said with a half-smile, caught between politeness and grim anticipation. "I hope the dawn brings you strength. We shall need it this day."

 

**SANSA**

She felt so absurdly _angry_ as she did what she was told, pulling on her dress and her cloak as Sandor's armor clanked and ground together. Even now, watching him prepare for war with that cold, merciless determination stark in his eyes, making his ravaged face seem yet more ferocious, she felt her heart beat faster and a growl in the back of her throat. Which just made her look away sharply, of course, whirling hair like a flag to him. Gods, he'd been... he'd felt so... and they'd been on the cusp of even _more_ , and at that moment-

_Truth and reality chooses to interrupt us._

She didn't forget her last item, though, and donning it seemed to quiet her anger. Sandor's dagger, its short scabbard and the belt for it was quickly bound around her waist, buckled at her middle, but she couldn't quite get it to settle-

Until she felt strong, sure hands shift and place the scabbard at the small of her back with practiced ease, tilting the handle of the blade so it was almost sideways, towards her right hand. Sansa turned and looked up past the black chainmail and into focused grey eyes.

"Man I knew, at King's Landing," he said by way of explanation, reluctantly letting her go. "He wore a blade like that. Suppose it made it easier to draw quickly, and it didn't drive the tip up his arse when he rode."

"That _would_ be inconvenient."

His mouth twitched into a fleeting smile. "Aye."

But there was nothing more to it. No stolen moment, frozen in longing, ripe with the sort of promise she'd become oddly accustomed to. No: that morning reeked of coming battle. Tents were being struck and rolled up all around them, every one that fell exposing more rising sunlight, horses stamped and whinnied in every direction, servants and soldiers and lords and everyone else was bellowing orders and everywhere, everywhere, weapons in scabbards and armor on bodies clanged and hammered with furious movement. Sandor was in his element now, and she knew it. He looked away from her and stepped to the flap, walking outside to find-

"Alight, boy, now you can take _ours_ down, too."

"Aye." 

Sansa smiled softly. Niall knew better than to argue, or grouse, or grumble. She'd known squires who would do that, though they were meant to be utterly loyal to their sers. Niall was not even a squire, just a sharp smallfolk who'd been plucked by Sandor for his knowledge, and yet he didn't argue. The sparse youth with his pointed chin and watchful eyes opened the flap and stepped inside, already wearing his brown jerkin coat and with a shortsword at his hip.

"M'lady, can I assist-"

"I need to go, Niall," she said smoothly, moving past him and... gods, barely even noticing how close she was to a boy that was, actually, quite comely. She would have blushed and fumbled her words years before; maybe thought of some of her more scandalous stories, where the lowborn, roguish but good-hearted squire won the highborn maiden. No longer. He was not Sandor, and he never would be. No-one would.

_Gods. There is danger in thinking so narrow._

"I must find out what the danger is," she said by way of additional explanation, resting a hand on his shoulder, eyes firm and reassuring. "I trust you to finish attending to this."

"Yes, m'lady."

"Thank you, Niall."

She stepped outside into the freezing bedlam and found tents falling like trees before lumberjacks and dozens, scores, hundreds of people already on carts on steeds and ready to move. Sandor was readying Stranger and Frost, her own pony, fastening their saddles and bridles and utterly ignoring the driving wind. But he stalled when he spied her, cloak and hood gripped tight under her chin.

"Gods, girl, get back in the fucking tent," he growled as she walked over, looking past him to the squat, looming form of Wylis' tent. "We'll be-"

"The tent is being taken down, as you ordered. We need to learn what has happened, Sandor. That means we need to find Lord Wylis." She spoke firmly, quickly, and Sandor didn't bother arguing. She smiled briefly, just one corner of her mouth quirking up. "Both of us."

Sandor breathed out quickly through his teeth and then nodded, pausing only to shout over her shoulder: "Boy?! We'll be back!"

"I ain't goin' nowhere!"

"Cheeky little sod."

Sansa rolled her eyes and a sliver of mirth broke through the tense layer around them, in the midst of an army readying for battle. "Oh, and I'm sure you were _never_ like that."

"Well, I didn't say _that_ , m'lady..."

He turned back to her and Sansa got her moment. Just a look, but in that look was that night and the morning and all they had shared and Sandor wasn't just an instrument of the Stranger, cloaked in blood and bred for butchery. His smile was soft, not cruel; his eyes sparkled, not blazed, and Sansa couldn't help but stroke his armored gauntlet, just once, as if haphazardly.

"Follow me, warrior."

_Yes. That suits far better. Not ser, not hound, not dog... warrior._

They found Lord Wylis crouched over a map on the ground, stabbing at it with his fingers, surrounded by his bannermen. Sansa could read their faces even as they approached. Earnest, stern, absorbing information with hard frowns hiding their eyes, turning their minds to the task at hand. But when she approached, all of them stiffened as if they were at a formal ball, bowing curtly to greet her, and she curtsied in response, answering Wylis' question with: "What is going on, Lord Wylis?"

He told her as quickly as he could, and she could feel Sandor grow restless without even moving a muscle behind her. She heard his breath catch and then hasten, deepen as if he were a dog that had scented some bloodied prey. Or is he were...

She cleared her throat and looked down at the map to hide her blush. Those two things, so different and yet so tightly entwined... she still did not understand that part of him.

"Your plan is to attack, I take it," she said, her own brow now furrowed as she tried to think clearly, eyes snapping down to the map. "They are in our path, I see. Going around them would take too long and there is little chance they would miss our passing."

Lord Wylis nodded his respect at her insight. "Aye, Lady Stark, we shall be. We don't want to waste our strength for the march nor the siege, but when battle cannot be avoided, we must fight it with all we have," he said, and she knew that last line was a quote. His father, perhaps? She pondered that for but a moment, before the determined look in his eyes returned. "Lady Stark, you must stay with the supply carts and what reserve we can spare, as your guard. There will be no place for you in battle."

Sansa sucked in a quick breath, bosom rising under her chest and gods, _why_ did she feel such indignation? She was not a warrior, had only fought with true, harmful intent a handful of times in her life (and a handful missing a few fingers, at that), but the idea that she should stand in the back while men died for her... it made her grind her teeth. Wylis seemed to see the gesture and his gaze moved to his bannermen, as if seeking their support.

"It is best, Lady Stark," Lord Oprey said in a voice she assumed he thought was soothing. "It will be a hard, fierce charge, lances and swords and pikes, and they outnumber us. We could not risk you-"

"I understand, Lord Oprey," she said with a nod of her head. "I am... not here for my martial skills after all."

_Ah. That's why. Because you are, still, just chattel to be paraded. Even after your fine words and your vision, you have more value to them as a face without a tongue but bearing a useful name, than you would as anything else._

The low rumble of chuckles that answered her only added to that bitter thought, and she fixed a brittle smile on her face that she hoped would fool them. Around them the last tents were being taken down, Lord Wylis' taking a dozen men to bring it to the earth, wrapping up lengths of hide before much of it had even hit the ground. Carts were trundling around, tents and cooking pots and sacks and bags of who knew what tossed into them as they went, and already, rough formations were coming together. 

"Well, in that case, I will-"

"Ah, m'lady, if I may?" She paused as Lord Tyber spoke up, taking a step forward and gazing... past her. At Sandor. "Yer shield here may be a bloody southron, but we've all heard he's a man of skill when it comes to swingin' steel. With your permission, m'lady, we would have him with us."

Sansa's mouth opened but the words wouldn't come. Him risking herself in her protection, that was one thing, but... a battle? With hundreds of men all aiming to do him harm? The fact that he'd survived dozens in the past and against far worse enemies than the fucking Freys didn't occur to her; all she saw was him cut down on some pointless battlefield, tumbling from Stranger or falling to his knees, body hewn-

"Lord Tyber," Ser Oprey answered sharply, glaring openly, "Clegane is Lady Stark's sworn shield, and thus his duty is to be  _always_ at her side. He cannot be expected to forsake his vow for the sake of _one engagement_." 

Sansa knew enough of the man to understand Ser Opey simply didn't want to fight next to a man he hated, rather than defending _sacred_ vows, but she didn't care. That was a fair answer and, yes, she could use it. She heard Sandor fumble behind her and growl softly, eagerly, but... no, she didn't care. Could _not_ care. 

"She'll be well enough guarded, Ser," said Tyber, an old dog who saw potential in any man and gods, how Sansa would have admired that if it was directed anywhere else. "She'll have the reserve with her and if the day does not turn our way, she'll have time to escape back towards White Harbor." He looked up at Clegane and grunted, smile on his face. "They don't say much good about yeh, Clegane, but they _don't_ call yeh a green bloody boy who don't know which end is the sharpy, if yeh follow me? I _knew_ yeh were at Blackwater. You bought Lady Stark back to us. Y'even fought your _bastard fucking brother_ to a standstill once, and I saw that monster wade through ranks of pikemen at the Oxcross. We'd need you, if Lady Stark would oblige."

Sansa felt his lips tremble and fury bubbled in her, folded hands now clutching each other as if imagining throttling the old man. She looked over her shoulder and could see a fierce, brutal pride on Sandor's face, along with some fair surprise. He'd probably never had anyone north of the Neck praise his abilities before. But the mood, as she saw it, was still against him. No, he would stay. He would remain her shield and-

-then _she_ went and buggered it up. Of course.

"Aye, and we know he was at the _Saltpans_ , too," Oprey said, emphasizing the name that had become a byword for pillage and heinous cruelty. His eyes bored into Clegane's and she felt him step forward, as if ready to draw his sword, but Oprey plowed on, voice dripping scorn. "And I'd rather not fight beside a man who raped and murdered scores with those wretches that Vargo Hoat-"

All that rudderless fury suddenly snapped to a different focus, the rumor and tall tales that had gnawed at her own soul now spat by another man. Saltpans. Gods, she remembered, and still she felt her guts quiver inside her when she accepted that she'd believed them. At least in the beginning. When Baelish told her with a sick, pleasured grin that "her" Hound had raped a score of women while his men set the town aflame... no, that was when she knew it was a lie.

Sandor would never do that. He was not his brother; would rather die that become even a shade of The Mountain. But the rumors and the whispers ever-followed him, and she knew that. A stain she could never erase and gods a-fucking-bove, didn't he have enough to atone for in the acts he _was_ guilty of?! As he went on she felt her eyes grow wider, her hands curl to fists and before he could finish her voice lashed out with violence that stunned all to silence.

"Sandor did _not_ do those things and you will _not claim so again_ in _my_ presence!" 

_... oh, sod it._

Wylis' mouth clicked as his jaw dropped, jowls trembling in surprise. Ser Oprey's face colored as if Sansa had just stripped naked before them all and similar expressions had the other men looking pointedly away and clearing their throats. All save Tyber, of course. That old stoat was smiling softly to himself and Sansa felt a rush of fear as she realized why. She hadn't spoken in solid, cold defence of her sworn shield. The vehemence of it, the fury and the... the _injury_ , she knew what _that_ sounded like. 

That of a woman defending one she loved. 

_Damn, damn, **damn!**_

"I... Lord Wylis..."

Sansa tried to cool her mind and see all the angles, leashing her emotions and finding the best solution. Maybe if she'd had longer to think, she would have, but she could see fresh retorts and arguments on their faces, just ready to be shot out, and Sansa swallowed hard and sent a silent prayer to the gods above and in the ground.

"Yes. I give you my permission." Sandor stopped breathing. She assumed he wasn't dead. "I know his skill and his experience. I'd match him against _any_ man in the Seven Kingdoms-" Gods, she couldn't keep the pride from her voice. _Have to work on that._ "-and I know he would fight well by your sides." She let her gaze slide to Oprey and turn to shards. " _All_ of you."

If there was any argument in them left, it fled without so much as a murmur after that. Ser Oprey clenched his jaw and by the way his eyes widened, she assumed that Sandor was grinning at him. Lord Tyber was nodding contentedly to himself, and Lord Wylis gave her a short bow. 

"Lady Stark, we appreciate your faith in your shield, and your desire to aid us however you can. Clegane, when can you be ready?"

"Soon as I know my-the lady's safe with this reserve yer talking about. Then I'll join you with Stranger. Gonna need a lance, though."

"You'll have one," Oprey managed to bite out somehow, with his teeth still clenched. "I'm sure we can manage." He spun to Wylis and nodded again, body bristling. "My lord, I must ready my men. With your permission?"

"Of course, Ser Oprey."

The knight stormed away so angry that Sansa fancied she could see smoke trailing from his ears. Wylis caught her gaze and his eyes widened comically for a second, then looked away. She crushed a grin. Ah, so he understood. But then it was over and when she turned Sandor was looking down at her, smooth red scars gleaming in the low morning light, wind blowing his hair away so he had no place to hide them, from the bone glistening wetly on his jaw to the black, puckered hole he had for an ear.

He was hideous in flesh, and Sansa knew that. She could never just ignore it... but she still felt as though her heart would crumble to dust in her chest at the thought of him charging with all the brave men surrounding her. His flesh was savaged and grotesque, and that told Sansa in some demented way once again that the stories were wrong, and reality was far more curious. He had the face of a monster and the heart of a warrior, of a gallant, of a _good man_ , and no-one would convince her otherwise. 

But now he was eager. She could see a passion there that was like a twisted, unholy twin to the one he'd shown her the night before. She remembered how long it had been since he'd shed blood, fought in a battle, _truly_ tested his skills. She assumed it must be... some strange compulsion, that afflicted men of his ilk, whom the gods seemed to fashion for war. Sansa knew he was strong, and able, and... and she knew if he died, she wouldn't be able to go on. 

"Sandor..."

She began and couldn't continue. _I love you and I hate that you want this so badly, and if you die in some stupid, nameless field I won't survive this. Please, please change my mind for me, like you always do._

Then she smiled. Not much of Sansa Stark's recent years had been happy, but peering past them, deeper into memory, she found her mother's whispered prayers. At Winterfell, in their rooms or in the godswood, her strange beliefs in seven gods, not the numberless ones of Sansa's own father, always making the girl question and shake her head. But now she remembered one, and it could have been made for Sandor.

"Warrior keep you, strengthen your arm and keep your blade keen," she said, managing a watery smile and wiping her eyes. It was the wind, or at least that's what she'd blame it on. "I know they're not your gods. Not mine, either. But I'd take any blessing for you right now."

Sandor couldn't hide his face from the bannermen watching them now; his back was not to them as Sansa's was. So he kept his face a mask of polite, stoic obedience as he bowed, words coming out in his usual scraping grumble.

"I thank you, m'lady..." 

And when his bow was at its lowest, and his lips were half-hidden by his hanging hair, he whispered and the winds carried the words to her.

"I'll come back, little bird."

Then he straightened and the wind was so bothersome that day. Always in her eyes. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, my thanks to this brain-busting NetNerd for an epic pool of Intel, opinions and details. I know that we're past canon now and it shouldn't matter, but I love to keep as close to the source material as possible... and I'm a terrific geek who loves reading this stuff. Heartily recommended to anyone else who might need it!  
> https://bryndenbfish.wordpress.com/2013/11/15/a-complete-analysis-of-the-upcoming-siege-of-winterfell-part-1/


	18. Chapter 18

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All credit to swimmingfox for inspiring me to try a second-person POV. I'mma try it out. Tell me what you think!
> 
> Oh, and after seeing some of the beautiful picsets on other works, if anyone gets the itch to bang out one for this fic, I'd be very grateful and shower thee with squee and exclamation points.

**HOSTEEN**

You don't even bother telling the men not to bury the dead. No point wasting time on corpses, and they know it as well as you.

 _Only thing they're fucking good for now, anyway_ , you think bitterly, raking harsh eyes like rotted wood over the ragged remnants. _Dying of the cold and leaving us with their rations. Cowardly fucking scum._

You wouldn't even call it a "camp", really. Just a massive patchwork of uprooted bushes, lengths of sheets and covers, holes dug in the ground and the precious, precious few tents they managed to grab while they were running headlong from the Crofter's Village. Dozens, hundreds of scarecrows in rags rise from the snow, staggering around with weapons in limp, careless hands. Many never rise. They stay as they were when they went to sleep the night before, never to wake, never to move. 

"Strip 'em and get a move on, dogs," you bellow at a handful of them as you pass, smirking as they jump as if bitten, hands roving swiftly over hard, blue bodies and taking everything that can be eaten or warm for warmth (and, as you well know, sold or spent later on). "Long way to White Harbor, don't want to waste time here..."

Gods, is _that_ what it's come to? It must be, or you wouldn't have said it. But you don't know where else to go, not with the skies raining ice and freezing water every damn day. Stannis and his shaggy mountain sellswords could be hot on your heels; you would be, if you were him. His horse were blocking you from Winterfell and the fucking Carwyn's - _oh, gods dead and old and known and forgotten, let me live long enough to raze that place to its roots_ \- wouldn't open their gates when you limped up to it, looking for shelter.

No room or supplies, that's what they'd said. You didn't even known it it was Lord Carwyn: just some voice shouting down at you, peeking out over the battlements. You'd threatened and gnashed your teeth but the coward wouldn't budge, and your men were in no shape for a siege.

Cowards. Dogs. Scum. Fools.

_If I had real men under my command, not these rats, Stannis would be getting flayed this moment, and Bolton would be showering me with praise._

"Lord Frey," one of your sers comes riding up and you suppress the urge to snarl. Gods, what would it be _now_? "What of the men bitten by frost in the night?"

"Those who can walk and fight can come," you say slowly, simply, as if explaining to a boy wrapped in foil, not a veteran knight in plate. "Leave the rest."

"My... My Lord..." Oh, he doesn't like that. Changed color like a whore with your hands around her neck. Not bloody noble enough. "Shouldn't we at-at least offer the gift of-"

"No time for mercy, ser," you sneer. The battle may have been lost, the Manderly horse fucking betrayed and abandoned them, and your men reduced to this, but you are still Lord Hosteen Frey, son of Lord Walder and commander of his Northern Army. "No time, no patience, and I'll not waste their strength on _dying_ cunts when _live_ cunts might be in need of it more, out _there_ -" you wave a hand towards White Harbor, unseen but out there, at the end of the silver ribbon winding through the landscape. "-waiting for us. Fill water skins and get them moving. _Fuck_ the frost bitten."

There. _Much_ better. Men scampering around doing your bidding, fear in their eyes and thus fire in their steps. That's the way it should be. Not this rabble, staggering around with their swords and crossbows dragging, huddling around sparse little fires, grousing, grumbling. Frostbite? What do they know of it? You left an ear behind in Winterfell thanks to that, but do you complain and grasp for sympathy?

You are a lord. You have your pride, and your sword is the finest among the Frey's. Cold is beneath your concern. But you are not your men, and more's the pity. You can see their eyes now as you ride slowly among them. Dark and sunken into hungry, despairing sockets. Shivering in hands covered by layer after layer and still slowly dying. Detritus, the lot of them. They'd broken almost immediately at the village, unable to stand against fur-clad savages with bronze swords and fucking _sticks_. You trot by one couple and some thin-faced youth dares to throw a glare your way, eyes hooded and ugly-

-until you kick out and send half the teeth flying from his head.

"Watch your fucking eyes, boy!"

"Muh... Muh Lud-"

You grin wider as he spits out a shattered incisor and gods, that makes the morning brighter. Eyes once defiant now swim and drown in terror; a bandaged hand small enough to tell you he's a few fingers lighter, comes up in trembling ward.

"Pluh... Ple-"

"Get up, you useless whoreson." You turn Warmonger away from him, moving with the others in your personal guard, left mostly unschated by the fighting outside the village, a messy brawl in swirling white marked by ribbons of flying scarlet. _They_ , at least, were loyal, and didn't complain. You'd have liked to deploy them but couldn't risk the danger to yourself. You weren't going to die in the North for Roose Fucking Bolton. "Next time I see your eyes darken on my face, I'll have them carved out and fed to my horse."

"My Lord?!"

Gods, it was that fucking knight again, but your curse dies on your tongue when you see the look of fear whitening his face. 

"Watchmen at the woods report approaching horse! Several hundred, they say!"

"Whose, damn you?!"

"Manderly, ser. No banners, but-"

"Then how the _fuck_ do-"

"My Lord, they come from the south," the ser says, and you decide to overlook his interruption. Lower orders need to be given their little moments sometimes. "There are no other forces we know of, so they must-"

"Yes, yes, yes, shut up and have the men ready."

You stand with your guard as the rest of the encampment writhes awake like a live thing infested with scurrying little ticks. At the first whiff of danger, oh, _then_ the men are ready to move. Pikemen shamble forwards, forming rough ranks. Crossbowmen behind them, some of them so useless that they're actually thawing their strings _now_. The rest shuffle forwards, kicking up tufts of snow with every step, gouging black lines in the white, some of them leaving red smears behind.

"Stay alive, you bastards," you mutter, and with feeling, as the last scouts come tearing through the woods and you see dark shapes moving beyond it. "Until I don't fucking need you, anyway."

Manderly's. The banners _were_ up. Gods, he'd skin those fucking scouts. You can see the green and white liveries clearly as man after man trots out from behind the cover of the woods and onto the rough road hugging the side of the White Knife. Armor gleaming. Lances held high. Mounts groomed and well-fed, and not a man walking among them. What in the hells were they doing out there?

_No matter. They're to help us, reinforcements, most likely. Still, doesn't hurt to be cautious, not after that fat bastard stirred up so much shite in-_

Your thoughts trail off as your blockish forehead wrinkles. You see a black mount near the center of the line, but the man riding him... coal-black, as well. Full plate, by the looks of it, shining in the bright, freezing Sun like a snake's eyes. The rider wears no helmet, but... is that paint, you can see? Covering half his face? No, as the line rides closer you can see-

Your heart turns to ice in your chest. It's a _line_. Three hundred heavy horse in a line, and that is not how you greet your allies at their "camp".

That's how you engage your enemy. 

"Crossbows," you shout, just as the approaching line begins to pick up speed. You can't look away from that black fucking rider. Your sword sings in the air as you unsheath it, Foeslayer ready to feast again, but... but it doesn't make you feel as safe as it should. "Nock and draw!"

At once nearly a hundred frozen fingers were fumbling with quarrels and strings, men grunting as they heaves tight strings to the nuts of their bows, then sliding iron-shod projectiles in place. You flash sweeping glance around you. Yes. Pikemen, crossbowmen, the rest armed with spears and swords and axes... plenty of scum between you and the cavalry-

-that's just lowered their lances.

Then the ground shakes and men shake with it and low like rising storm then thunderous like the wrath of giants three hundred charging men cry out their hatred and you scream, "LOOSE!"

 

**SANDOR**

He felt it growling the entire ride from the woods. Like waves on rocks, faint but insistent, growing in strength. He never thought it was buried on the Quiet Isle, along with the rest of that life. He could easier chop of a leg, an arm, his own _head_ than carve that part of himself away and just discard it. It was always there, snarling at him to release it whenever his heart quickened and men with hard eyes were in his path and the air stank of grounded lightning. 

Sandor gripped his reins tighter to stop his hands from shaking. Too long. Easier to do without wine than this. 

 _Remember why_ , he told himself, taking down a deep lungful of cold air that seemed to freeze his guts. _Don't lose yourself._

He smirked on Stranger's back and shifting his hand on the lance. Oak, as he preferred. The handle was polished wood and not hempen, though. He would adapt; tuck it further into his armpit to steady himself. Stranger wouldn't be a problem: the old bastard knew war as well as him, and wouldn't shirk or bolt. 

A myriad of options and choices, adjustments he made without seeming to move. Always with his eyes fixed on the edge of the woods, hungry only for the sight of-

"Something funny, Clegane?"

His eyes snapped to Tyber and the old man just raised an eyebrow, face the same craggy cliffside of indifference as usual. Sandor found himself... not liking, but appreciating the man. He wasn't one to cling to grudges when there was blood to be spilled, and he could look him in the eye. 

"Tired of waiting," he said, not bothering to sweeten it anymore. "Want to..."

_Get it over with? No. That's the **last** thing you want._

"Get stuck in?"

Sandor grunted a laugh and nodded. Old man was growing on him. 

"Heh, don't worry, lad," the old man said with a sniff, shifting his grip on the bastard sword at his side for the tenth time. Restless. Eager, in his own way. "Plenty for all, I'd mark ye..."

They circled the woods and Sandor saw with greedy eyes that the old man wasn't wrong. Frey's stained the snow in stuttering black and brown smudges, a rough carpet of them spread over it like fleas. A couple of horsemen were killing their mounts racing back to the main body, and Sandor could see the men were already warned, already coming together in lines and blocks. 

His eyes were wide now, focused and devouring the setting. Woods to their back, open field to the front where their enemy waited, and to the right... but the left was the shores of the Knife, steaming with ice melting in the morning Sun, but still death to any man who dared more than a few minutes within it. Sandor flicked a glance down the right of the line and nodded to himself with professional satisfaction.

 _Fat lord has the line extended properly. Sweep around from the right when we hit them, fold them in, push them towards the river._ He frowned. _But they outnumber us. If they try to break out-_

_Enough! We have waited long enough!_

Sandor swallowed and closed his eyes a moment. He'd carried it for so long it had grown a voice. Sometimes it was him; sometimes, at the worst times, it was almost Gregor. It didn't care; didn't plan to strategize. it wanted only the wet, rushing impact. The tremor of steel crunching and slicing through flesh and grinding bone. That fierce, animal joy when you watched twin candles blow out in your enemy's eyes and you knew both that you had won, and there were plenty more to come.

"READ-Y?!"

Lord Wylis' bellow slapped him out of his dark thoughts, and Sandor growled at himself. No time for fucking introspection; plenty of that on the Quiet Isle, and what had it changed?

 _Much_ , he heard the Elder Brother say, with that soft smile and a tone that spoke of more years than he'd lived. _Unseen and seen, by you and the gods._

The Manderly host moved swiftly to obey their lord, a marked contrast in Sandor's eyes to the sluggish, slovenly way the Freys seemed to move. They were parts of an animal flopping around in rough unity; Manderly's were oiled and practiced, their column soon becoming a long line, but the center spread and sharpened to a point. Sandor was near the piercing tip, as he'd hoped.

"FOR-WARD!"

It was the work of a minute. Probably less, but still Sandor felt the moments drop one by one like boulders before a landslide. Paining him. So long, so long...

A fraction of a league, Stranger bounding under him, in time with the other horses but already champing and biting, yearning as much as his master. Above him, Sandor felt the world sharpen in the space of a breadth. He could feel every lick of frigid air on what little skin he still had exposed; the rush of it howling in his ears, the crashing roar of hundreds of hooves. He swallowed and ice went down with it, bitter anticipation following. They closed the gap and just before Wylis shouted again, the final order, he could make out faces behind the pikes, squashed by helmets, eyes wide with fear.

Some were already running. Lords and sers on horses made sure they didn't get far. 

"LANCES... DOWN!"

Hundreds of them whirled through the air, and suddenly the line had teeth, long and honed and bobbing in the air. It was a matter of paces now, and Sandor tightened his grip on the lance, squeezing it so tight under his armpit that he could almost feel the wood creak... but the tip did not waver.

He picked out a face. A boy not more than twenty years walking the world, shaking so hard his pike danced and sweat ran down his face in rivers. 

Sandor did not care. It did not matter anymore. 

Then there was the sound of a whole orchestra of strings being thrummed at the same moment, deep and bass, and the air was filled with quarrels, flashing bits of dark, sharpened wood and metal-

_Should have used those earlier._

Around him, men died. Horses, too. One quarrel slammed into a horse's head and it whinnied high and clear before blood and bile choked it, stumbling and throwing the ride, almost comical as he flew screaming with his lance still gripped. Sandor did not watch him land. Other men tumbled off horses that plowed on regardless, minds too focused and yet too primitive to do anything now but keep running until something stopped them. Iron bolts that could have pierced heavy plate ripped through main and jerkins with ease, impaling hearts and lungs and eyes and legs, sending men flying to the Stranger before their corpses struck the ground.

Men screamed, but the answering roar of rage from the charging horsemen drowned them out and Sandor joined it until his throat was trembling-

The Frey line was already shuddering; a great, frightened, undulating thing that was only kept in line by-

Sandor's eyes flickered to the clump of horsemen behind the center. One man built like an upright bull with features seemingly carved out of blocks, waving a bastard sword around, shouting orders and Sandor had no idea were being obeyed or not. _Commander_ , he thought instantly, filing him away and lowering the lance and his face split and-

When the lance struck, the growling thing roared right along with him, and Sandor was free.

 

**SANSA**

"By the gods..."

It didn't seem real. It unfolded with such simple, brutal inevitability that Sansa thought for a moment that she was watching a play. She couldn't believe men could butcher each other in such... synchronicity. Hundreds of souls, split by house and hatred, crashing into each other in a mad clash of blood and bone and metal and wood and dying horses and screaming boys and it didn't stop. The charge slammed into the Frey center and it seemed to implode, front ranks crushed underfoot, others tossed into the air as lances struck them and ripped them off their feet like they were straw dummies.

The wedge held as it advanced, leaving broken and writhing bodies in its wake. 

Sansa didn't take her eyes off the smudge of black in the middle of the bedlam. She and Wylis' reserve had shifted round to the right, for both a clearer view of the battle and a smoother route away from it, in case-

_No. That is not going to happen, it is **not**._

She knows she can't see his face. But she can see _him_ , and when he and Stranger, just one big black blur amidst the grey and white and green, slam into the Frey lines, she steels her jaw and strangles the sob that wants to escape her lips. Her men need her to be strong, too. They take their courage from her, of that much she knows, so when that insane clash cracks out across the sky like rolling thunder, she sits higher in her saddle, and she does not look away. 

 

_i put it through his chest and it blows out his back and the fucking boy screams and coughs up his guts. too fucking fast. can't pull the lance back out._

_i drop it and pull the longsword and stranger's biting all around and now it's a real fucking scrum. men so close and so thick they can bearing swing their steel. riders pressed in close to me, too, and i'm shoving them, too, just to get them out the way._

_every stroke and i feel the shudder through my blade, my armor, my flesh. the rip of leather and cloth. the cleaving of flesh. the spray of blood on stranger's flanks. i'm laying about and screaming and a swipe slashes a second mouth on some boy carrying a mace and when he falls the mouth yawns and vomits blood like a geyser._

_it sprays me, bathes me, stinks of salty iron and i swallow it._

"Lady Stark, careful..."

She nearly starts off her horse when the hand floats out of nowhere to alight on her shoulder. The horseman with a full brown beard jerks it away as if she's made of flame, face flushed and apologetic.

"Apologies, m'lady. You were leaning too far forward. Could have f-"

"I'm fine," she said and gods she doesn't care about her fucking tone anymore. The butchery is in earnest now, wrestling masses of grey and black and green on white staggering drunkenly across the mat of snow. She can't make out faces, but... limbs. Hacking and rising and thrusting. Falling. Flying away. Screams that pierce like raven's calls, but higher and mortal. Pitiful. So many of them. Horses screaming, a sound beyond words, and it didn't stop. Black dots running from the battle already, some of them hobbling, but there were plenty trying to hold the line, push back against the wedge of horseman once charging freely, now grimly slugging through the mass like a man slashing through heavy foliage-

"No!"

Sansa barks the word as if speaking it could alter her eyes, but it doesn't. Sandor tumbles from Stranger, and he's lost in the formless bloody brawl.

 

_fucking pikemen. even if they don't stick you, they scare the fuck outta the horses._

_i'm heaving it through the air with one hand and every time i do a fresh arc of blood and chunks whips out at men around me. slash it down and rip open some frey's body from shoulder to stomach and i can see his ribcage winking at me and his entrails purge on the ground like steaming snakes covered in bone shards._

_i grin and taste salt on my tongue. they're all around me. so many._

_then stranger rears up and it's more than fear; it's pain. two frey bastards and driving him up and back with pike and spear and one stabs into his flank and he's almost standing straight up and i can't hang on-_

_i'm flying for a moment but then every part of me rattles and aches. the ground is a fucking swamp. hooves and feet churning it all up, warm streams of blood doing the rest. lucky for me: probably broke my back otherwise._

_someone slashes down at me and i throw up my longsword, knock it away, stab it through his stomach._

_gods, you never forget that. that beat of resistance through the clothes and the skin. you almost think, in some mad fucking way, that it'll hold. ward you off._

_but it doesn't. you keep going and you feel his breath shake through your blade. you feel the blood race down it and soak through the gaps in your gauntlet. you see him cough and blood's on his lips and I twist it and pull it free and he's on his knees, trying to stuff his guts back into the whole._

_i take his fucking head off as i get up to my knees. those fucking pikemen are next._

 

Sansa shudders when she sees him, all the bone going out of her back and she nearly sways off the horse. She held the reins so tight that the poor pony started to get restless under her, but she couldn't take her eyes off where he'd fallen. It was nothing but chaos. Men falling and sometimes rising... arms endlessly whirling... horsemen going this way and that, riderless mounts doing the same... 

_Please. Please, don't let him die today. I need-_

Then she gasped and saw a black blur rise back to its feet. He was moving again, every sweep of his arms seeming to end a life. The smile of breathless relief faded from her eyes a little. Then, as she kept watching, her mouth straightened into a hard line. She still couldn't take her eyes off. The wind whittled around her ears and the reserve were muttering to each other, younger men eager to join their fellows, but Sansa's eyes were wide as soup bowls and her lips were still. 

There was a purity to it. Terrible, merciless, but pure, the way a venomous snake or... yes...

_Like a wolf. Fashioned to hunt and kill._

Sansa had seen him end lives before. The men who would have violated her a dozen times in King's Landing were dead before they could even make it once. She remembered the cold, detached expression he wore, utterly immobile save for his eyes that dripped hatred. Sansa could only remember his arm moving a handful of times, and yet every blow was for the kill. Opening guts. Slitting throats. Stabbing between ribs with the precision of a maester. 

But he'd been cold. Methodical. Just stepping on roaches. It had scared her, seeing the still bodies that would never move again, the blood gushing out of them... but she knew he'd not loved it. Now she saw what part of her secretly feared. She saw Sandor unbound in battle, and chose to watch him. Every sweep and slide of his limbs. Every blow he parried or avoided and ever return that made some small black or grey smudge vanish before her eyes.

Sansa swallowed and gods, she could feel tears sting behind her eyes. A dog will not lie to you, and he hadn't. Not about what he was, and what he loved.

If she looked hard enough (or too hard, depending), she could almost make out the teeth shining in his mouth as he roared, and more than once, she swore she could see him smiling.

 

_the beast's strong and daring, but it isn't fucking smart. i wallow in it longer than i should have. fucking idiot. too long out of practice._

_i'm not smiling anymore. not laughing. stranger's kicking out everywhere he can reach and one passing frey goes down screaming, hand over the crater where his eye used to be. i end him with a thrust under the ribs and move onto the next man stranger dealt with._

_one bite and half the skin on his throat was gone. just a mass of pulsing red and dripping yellow fat. probably how i looked after gregor had done with me. without the steam and burned stench._

_the beast can't do this. it just wants it. it never sat through the lessons or the sparring. it was just there for the blood, and didn't care about the how._

_but i do. now there are no smiles, no laughter. there are those in your way, and how you deal with them._

_my arms are moving almost faster than my mind. some big fuck with an ax swings it and i sway to my left and step forward at the same time, waiting for it to pass-_

_-running him through his guts, until the longsword peeks out his back and i gip with both hands and rip-_

_-to the side-_

_-and it bursts out and takes most of his ropey guts with it. i feel them plop onto the ground, joining the shit and vomit and gallons of blood, then move onto-_

_a kid with a poor attempt at a beard is already raising his mace and-_

_-i slash up and across with two hands, longsword like a bloody knife in my hand, she feels so light._

_the frey seems to split up the middle and he coughs wetly, looking down with cross-eyed as his torso splits open like he's about to shit out a brat or something. he falls back and there's that bastard with his fucking friends. when you're a soldier, it's easy to tell the two ways to tell who's in charge: the one riding when everyone else walks, and the one who isn't fight, save with words._

_two more. three. spear and sword and hatchet. i don't see their faces, just their eyes when they winkle out forever. my longsword is greasy as i swing it, choked and gorging. the freys aren't breaking. not yet._

 

 _He cut that boy's face in half,_ her mind repeats numbly. She saw it, across a long field of red and white and yet it was as if she were mere feet away. The Frey came at him and Sandor brought that massive sword around and... and...

Sansa sniffed back something as she saw half a hood and bloody chunks of hair sail into the air. It wasn't tears she felt choking her. It was bile, effluence and offal threatening to leap out of her throat... and she forced it down. She swallowed hard even though it burned like venom and when she exhaled, it was through clenched teeth.

_No. If they can take this, if he can, then I must. Men are killers, and half this country is killing the other half. Best get used to looking at them._

"We're breaking them," she hears someone say behind her, one of the horsemen, voice tight. "Right flank's caught up, pressin' 'em around."

"They've still got the numbers. That cu-" A throat quickly cleared. Someone remembering there's a highborn present. "-man leading 'em gets them all swinging in one way, they'll carve through us. Have to reform. Won't have-"

Horns. Deep and sharp and blasting through the icy air. Sansa looks up and she can see flashes movement coming down the grey-shrouded hillock behind the Frey camp. Too fast, too big to be just men, but she can't... she can't see-

"Banners. Banners, do you see them?!"

"Dunno, m'lady, mist's still down over the hill" one of the men answers, trying to steady his horse. "But we best make ready to-"

"We can't leave!"

Him. You can't leave him. 

"Aye, we can, Lady Stark." The man shot her words back at her with his stubbly face grim but his eyes conflicted at the idea of manhandling Lady Stark of Winterfell. A red, puckered scar shone from cheek to forehead and Sansa suspected his hardness was why he was there: to protect her and to force her, if necessary. "If Lord Wylis does not win the day, we will be riding back to White Harbor. I gave him my word on that."

Bubbling anger. Impotence that only heated it to frothing inside her. She could do nothing, and she knew it. Not aid, not fight off this new guard, not talk her way out of it... just watch, as Sandor murdered his way through the throng and the looming clump of horsemen rode towards them all through the vanishing mist. 

 

**HOSTEEN**

_Unbelievable. Un **fuckingb** elievable!_

Your men are breaking, and you bloody well know it.

Even that lackwit Jingelbell could have seen there were three Freys to ever Manderly charging towards them. Even that deceased sodding _moron_ could have told you that charging horses can't charge through a solid mass of man. The impact is horrific but the middle and rear... they are untouched, if your nerve holds. And a man on a slow, trapped horse is just easier to kill. Suffer the first charge, with the right weapons, hold long enough to start pulling men of their mounts or just killing them under their arses, and cavalry weren't fucking invincible.

"Hold! HOLD YOUR FUCKING GROUND!"

But now you're slashing at your own men almost as much as the enemy. Crossbowmen throw down their knight-killers and bolt for the misty hill to the rear. One get ten feet before you whirl and lay open his back. It's a drop in the bucket. The back ranks are heaving, pressed by their own numbers and the shrieking, shouting, pleading mass of bloodied Freys pushing them from the other way, desperately trying to escape. The more their fellows beg and plead, the more it grates on them, and now and then the solid lines pushing back sprout gaps as men throw down their weapons and run, heedless of the fact they're fleeing into a wilderness of ice, without food or shelter. 

_They just want to get away; eke out a few more hours of life without a sword in their chests. Broken men._

You feel a snarl ugly your face as you see Fat Wyman's fatter son still mounted, still hacking away even as his perfect fucking wedge started to crumble under the chaos. You snap your head around and your guard are still there, a dozen hard-faced sons of whores all, and every one with too much to owe you and your father to run like cowards. You turn back to Wylis and spit.

"Follow me!"

_I'll rip their fucking head off with one-_

Then you see him.

 

_i'm cutting down more men fleeing than fighting and it's fucking maddening. so many wanting to flee, throwing down weapons and rushing for the back ranks, trying to push their way through their friends, begging them to open their gaps._

_not much fucking chance of that._

_spear, on my left. i'm swinging down the sword as it goes for my stomach, knocking it away and spinning with the motion-_

_-taking the fucking across the chest with the backswing, deep and hard enough to have his lungs breath straight through his fucking ribs as he falls back._

_shit keeps getting into my eyes. i'm spitting mud and blood and had little chunks of whatever. my heart isn't beating, it's battering me, every vein it pumps through, and i don't feel the throb in my hand until long after._

_i see that brick-headed fucking lord. getting ready to charge with his friends, eyes on-_

_the fat lord. of course._  

I remember. I remember my duty. Not just to kill anymore. That's just part of it. 

Protect her. Get her home. Help her get it back. 

I see blue like mountain pools and red like the first robin's breast. Just a flash, in the time it takes to blink.

Then I'm back, and I'm screaming at the fucker.  

 

"Fuck the gods!"

The monster in black clotted with chunks of Frey roars and it echoes around them like the cry of a dragon. You can't look away as you take in something from a time long past, and best forgotten. Half his face is normal, if severe, but the other is a daemon's scream of agony. Scar tissue both shiny and dull, smoothed by age and barely hidden by the hair left long. His eyes are sinkholes of hatred and when he roars, you swear he's coughing up blood not his own. 

He spreads his arms wide and in one is a longsword as tall as your son. He's challenging you. Pointing out you, like some wildling chieftain. 

"Fucking savage _bastard_ -!"

You ride headlong and raise your sword. No gods-cursed fucking freak is going to stop you. Now you can show them how it's done, and the big man pulls back his longsword and you swipe at his head, textbook blow, just like back at-

-the place where you _didn't_ hit naught but empty air-

-as the giant ducked down to one knee and swung-

-at your horses front knees. 

 

_fucking people. they never think of the simple sodding solution._

_lord brick-head takes the bait and he comes straight at me like a knight from he stories, looking to hack me down at full gallop. so i let him get close as i want, then go down fast and swing faster-_

_fucking blast in my hands feels like fire all over again. i barely keep hold of the sword, but i hear bones shatter and break and the horse screams and some corner of me feels fucking awful. shame about that. but it put the cunt on his arse._

_he goes down with his head flying over it, actually, war cry turned to yelp of panic like a bloody woman. but his friends are right behind him and there's more of them than me._

_the first comes in the same way but rears up his mount instead, hoping those kicking hooves will do me in. i step to the side, boots squelching bloody mud, pulling back the longword at the same time-_

_-then lunge, stabbing it like a spear through his side, pushing until i feel organs pop like rotten fruit and the shaking shudder of bones scraping the blade, then pull it back-_

_another's almost on top of me and brick-head's getting back to his feet. the horseman slashes down hard and I parry, his sword going up and out of the way. i lash out and grab him by the shirt and pull, hard as I can-_

_-ripping him out the saddle and onto his back. he's got enough time to splutter through blue lips, just once, then my iron-shod boots crash down on his face._

_crunching. cracking. like stepping on a bowl of walnuts. i do it twice more and when his nose is in his brain, I turn to brick-head._

 

The anger keeps you on your feet and in the world more than pride of fucking duty. Filthy bastard puts you on your arse, and gets away with it?! You shake off the shock and half your face is freezing and caked with mud. But you kept your sword, and whirl on the man.

He's big. Easily bigger than you, but his arms are the same. Thick and hewn with muscle, and he knows how to use them. Ralys and Saran fall to his violence before they can even dent him, and then he turns to you. You feel fear, but it only feeds your anger. Best swordsman of the Freys. That's what you were. Now to prove it. 

You charge forwards and feint to your right, then pull back as his longsword comes in to block. Fucking amateur. Clearly just a big man with a big sword who thinks muscles make everything. You give a feral smirk as you bring your sword tight and thrust for his groin, a nice slow death in the snow-

No. He can't be moving that fast, not a man so huge. No-one's as fast as him, not at the Towers-

The man sweeps down and away with his metal-covered arm and knocks away your thrust, stepping closer your lunge does the same for you-

"Predictable _wanker_."

His boot swings up and your entire world becomes burning white lights.

 

_fucking highborns. fighting with honor, and they wonder why so many of 'em fucking die in duels._

_simple feint. didn't think he'd be so easy, but there it was. so i played along and when his real stroke came, i was ready for it. i grunt as something splits in his gauntlet but swallow it down, spitting the words and burying my boot in his crotch. bad enough when i'm barefooted. fuck knows how bad it is with iron wrapped around them._

_he folds like an old sack and goes down with a woman's shriek. good luck finding them in the bath later, cunt. then one of his guards is on me, slashing with a curved sword and when i try to hit back-_

_-clever fuck swings his horse around my way, battering me off-balance with the white head of the beast, so angry and frightened it's white are all that i can see in its eyes. he comes in again and i stagger back, swinging low at the same time-_

_-laying open the nag's stomach and spilling all of it on the floor like an explosion of stink and offal._

_the horse goes mad. throws the boy. he doesn't splat on the mud; something crunches wetly when he lands and he cries out. i walk over and-_

 

Gods. You doesn't even know if they're still there, let alone damaged. 

Pain quickly turns to paralysis and as hard as you command, you're body just won't listen. Everything below the waist is... not up for discussion. You just want to lie there until this is over, and not think to hard about the horrifying dribbling feeling from your breeches.

Go ahead. Your father'll never forgive you.

You growl and grope for you sword. Every twitch and attempt hurts, but you swallow it and the bile and get to your knees. Fucking Glombell as well, losing his steed to the savage, then the rest of him? Not bloody likely. You wait until the black knight is safely turned his back and then you swing.

He senses it. Somehow. You don't know. But he turns as you lurch up to your feet and lunge, longsword coming up sharply-

-but not sharp enough.

 

_HELL'S FUCKING CUNT!_

_fucking brick-head cunt nearly took my fucking hand off! sword edge smacks right into the back of the hand and even through plate, i can feel something break. the longsword drops from my hand. brick-head is grinning like a fool and swings again-_

_-and i'm backing away like a coward, pulling my bastard with my good hand. well, surviving hand._

_brick-head comes in hard a second time, slashing left and right and when i counter, he's pretty smooth with one one his own. he slides his bastard over the edge of your own when you clash again, probably looking to grind it down towards you and slice you up, but when he does your close, and-_

_-you throw your back into a headbutt, and the brik-head-lord goes down with his nose spread across his face._

_the horseman comes at me from the side, thrusting with a dagger. without thinking i snap out my gauntlet and the jab nails him in the face-_

_STRANGER'S SHIT!_

_injured hand. fucking injured hand._

_but i bury it long and deep enough to finish him with the bastard, cutting open his chest with two solid strokes from the bastard as he flails around with a busted nose. and speaking of which-_

 

They're Manderly men, and you feel an eel of fear crawl into your insides and call it home. 

The new riders bear the sigil and banners of the men attacking you, and if you hoped for rescue, well, you were kidding yourself. Father won't fight son, not in that war, and the Manderly men arriving take one look at the two sides, and decide within a moment. They don't both to form up before crashing into the rear of your men, and-

"Fucking _cowards_!" You scream out the words right before your grind steel with the burned man. "Fight! Reform around me and-"

Any Frey listening would be sorely disappointed at the lack of an ending. Unless they were counting bubbling gurgles. 

You go back down and now it's exploding black stars in front of your eyes. Your feet are trying to walk away from you ankles and the word has just shifted about ninety degrees without telling you. The ground... yes, that seems safer. You fall back down but keep your sword up, trying to ward him away, crawling through the now-flooded mire of dead and dying (today or some other day), trying to get back to your feet.

Then you hear the horns again. Listen to their bleak, sonorous sound carry through the clear air. You can see fresh riders in the back of the camp, now, among your men. Arms rising and falling and holding sharp steel like they're cutting down the window wheat. At your right, Freys are running, bolting, or stupidly dying. Splashes. Deep and surrounded afterwards by the pitter-patter of droplets. Men jumping into the river, trying to escape and finding only cold death. 

Flames cover your hand and you look up to see the burned man kick your sword away. The fighting begins to thin around him. More Freys are leaving than staying, not willing to face a mounted foe on both sides. Your own men are actually running away from you, and the burned man has seen enough of war not to bother with them. 

His eyes are like molten metal. His chest is heaving and one of his hands is at an odd angle. His face is so caked in blood and gore you could barely even tell he was burned. Ropes of it cover him from scalp to sole, shreds of hair and clothing, too. He spits to one side and raises his longsword and fuck you don't want to die in the fucking _North_ -

"WAITWAITWAIT! I-I am Hosteen Frey, you understand?! I can-"

The burned man shrieks and you've never heard anything like it. Never will, either. His longsword comes down and your stomach splits open, animal howl still ringing in your ears, right before pain overloads that along with everything else. You cough up bile and again, the longsword comes down. Inferno across his chest. Deep and piercing. You look up and you're not ready to let go.

Hope. All men have it. Foolish and baseless as it often is, you reach out with a hand now missing a finger, to match the hole where your ear used to be, just as the monster rears back for one final blow.

Snow is sliding and dancing in between them. The dead will be lost under snowdrifts before midday. The big man is panting so hard his teeth are pulled back and stained gums are shining wetly. There's nothing in his eyes but hatred now, that moment before the killing blow. You cough up some part of your bifurcated stomach and manage to mutter: "Hos...tage..."

The sword comes down again, from a face split and scorched, howling like a wolf, teeth blinding as blood stains them, eyes wide and maddened you feel the impact. You're sure of it. Your body shakes and there's the suggestion that you should be in pain, but your brain doesn't... seem to be in command anymore. The world falls away like I was all a dream, and you know there should be pain-

But there isn't. Then there's

nothing

at

a-

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Great article on Sandor's likely fighting technique. Gods, I love Netfolk...  
> http://asoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/topic/82942-from-pawn-to-player-rethinking-sansa-xix/page-3
> 
> And the first-person stream o' consciousness was something that landed on my noggin while I was making a pot of Twinings. Opinions! I feed on feedback (said he groaning at the redundancy of his vocabulary...)!


	19. Chapter 19

**SANDOR**

He didn't see the Titan; didn't much care to, either. No desire to be staring up and up some big fucking stone man until you looked flat skyward and, what, you were looking at his great granite gonads? He stayed in his cabin and drank, and remembered and tried to forget. His beard was thick now, covering one cheek up to his hair and down to his neck, the other side growing out in tufts and clumps, burned flesh giving no soil for hair to grow. 

He listened in his cabin, at the sound of a city approaching. 

Bells and horns, crashing brashly through the air. Seagulls in great swarms, fighting and swooping and claiming everything not covered or nailed down. A slew of voices and accents Sandor would never fucking understand, but here and there, a snatch of Common. The suggestion of a Westerosi accent, wrapping its clipped tone around the squirming tones of Braavosi and Pentoshi and High Valyrian. 

Feet pounded over his head, and gods, was his headache _already_ so bad they sounded like mammoths? He staggered upright and grunted when the numbness in his bad leg became shards of ice, stabbing and gouging with hidden blades. He was getting old. Everything creaked in the morning now. He splashed his face until he could stand without clutching the edges of the table. Nothing to look at, of course. Not with the mirror smashed beyond use and repair. 

Tentative knocking at the door; barely even any force behind it. Sandor smirked on his bad side, mere twitch of his lips pulling them back all the way to his molars. 

_Probably hoping you're still insensible. Then they could say they at least **tried** to-_

Knocking. Harder. Louder. "I am not going away" kind of knocking.

"What?"

The door opens and Viletus is standing there. No smile anymore, not after a week trapped on the same stinking wood with him. The man just looks him up and down and strokes that ridiculous fucking beard and Sandor glares straight back at him.

"We are at port, my friend."

"Time to go, is it?"

"Much as it pains."

Sandor laugh is more like a death rattle as he flattens one nostril closed with his thumb and blows the other one out into the wash basin. "Aye, I bet it fucking does..."

To his great sodding surprise, there was no ceremony nor tearful goodbyes. He dressed quickly and packed quicker, haversack slung over his shoulder with his weapons, armor clanking softly as he climbed the stairs. It felt better, at least, to have steel and iron surrounding him again. More like himself. Braavos was spread about the horizon in a hundred sprouting islands that seemed utterly man-made. Sandor could barely see dirt or grass, just endless brick. He knew the city was riddled with canals, but still...

"Perhaps not the best city for a horse, my friend," Viletus said, jerking his chin towards his crotchety stallion being gingerly risen from the hold. "Better to sell for glue."

"Not bloody likely," Sandor rumbled, warning a cabin boy away with a quick glare when he raises a rope to whip Stranger. "I owe you anything more."

"The cost of a mirror."

He grunted and rolled his eyes. _Always smashing things_ , he thinks as he digs around for some loose coin. _And you never learn: you've always got to pay for it after._

They don't even share fare-thee-wells. Sandor settled his haversack onto Stranger's back, and then himself. A rabble of laborers and sailors and travelers and beggars scatter out of his path as he canters down the wooden pier, clip-clop of Stranger's feet on wooden feeling so strange to him. Almost like he's riding on a building, not a pier feet above the water. Already he spies with an eye long-experienced, the young men with shirts hung carelessly open, hair tousled, hands ever-wandering close to the thin needle-like swords at their hips... but never quite touching them.

_Laying a hand on them in front of another can be taken as a challenge. Gods, where did I learn-_

Her. He learned it from her. Sandor's jaw twitched. Stupid oaf. Of course he'd think of her. He had a life's worth of memories, but all the best, all worth holding onto... they had red hair and pale cheeks and that smile that always came with a breathless laugh and-

" _Korazdi... korazdi, mala..._ "

Beggars lined the wall at the end of the wharf. Travel a thousand miles, cover oceans, deserts, forests, wastes, and wherever you landed, there would be those with wealth and those in poverty. That never changed. Sandor rode past them without looking down; he'd need every coin he had left. The stink made his nostrils quiver and he heard them croak again, those same words in their bastard language, twisted from High Valyrian into what it was today, like a fine oak tree hacked and hammered and carved into some strange idol. 

He didn't understand the words. He knew the tone. The rasping wetness that said bile and blood was in their throats. Sandor risked a glance down to the nearest-

Black rags, covering a skinny body and arms, but not ankles and feet, shapely and feminine. The voice croaked again and there was a bowl held high in hands with knuckles red and weeping with pus.

" _Korazdi... korazdi, mala..._ "

Sandor breathed in sharply. Memory was a treacherous thing; it didn't ask permission and never told you what summoned it. It came as it willed and when Sandor brought Stranger to a halt and looked down, he saw amber eyes glowing under the hood, then the brown ones long dead in a frozen field. 

 

**WYLIS**

"Mercy... please, mercy..."

_Wrong day for that._

He tries to feel some shred of sympathy for the boy with red hands. Not much older than his daughters, actually, and lying in the mud with tears and mud streaking his face, he's hardly the fearsome enemy you train for years to cut apart. He's just a young man far from home, bleeding out with no kin close by to mourn. There are hundreds of his fellows still littering the field, though. Some begging. Most just concentrating on breathing. Wylis looks down from his horse and pauses.

He doesn't give voice to his thoughts. It would taste of mockery, and this faceless, nameless greenboy from south of the Neck has not earned that from him in his last moments.

 

One of his dismounted horsemen takes a thin dagger and with quick, clinical care, slides it between the boys ribs. Wylis blinks slowly as he hears a final, desperate sucking breath that ends with scarlet bubbles. They dribble down the boy's chin and his chest caves in one last time. Then he's still, and his pain is over.

All around him, the scene is repeated. The mist has burned off the ground and there is no hiding the butchery now. Every figure, standing and laying, is clear to the eye. Every writhe and twitch and downward slice or stab of "mercy". Horses thrash and toss their manes on the ground, frothing and gouging at the bloody muck around them, too injured to move. The stench... gods, Wylis will never get used to it. Shit and innards and rusting blood and all the evils of the human body quickly ended, mingled together and rising from a thousand flowers of dead flesh. 

Wylis has seen comrades he's known for years, even survived Harrenhal with, fall that day. Most will rise again. Some will not. Finishing the enemy wounded is one distasteful necessity of a battle aftermath; doing so to your own is only a shadow away from a sin.

"My Lord cousin?" A familiar voice stretched with exhaustion snaps him from his thoughts. "The gods are good today... for the most part."

Wylis manages a smile, and it's true, as any of his would be at the sight of his cousin, alive and cantering towards him. But that same exhaustion wearies it, keeps it from touching his eyes. The two men in plate and like livery sidle up to each other and embrace, the Lord whispering in Ser Kamber's.

"Fine thing, to see you again, Kamber."

"Without doing so over a battlefield," the round-cheeked ser said, shaking his head. "It could have come to that."

"I knew it. But my father would like have planned to the eventuality."

The ser's face fell at the mention of his father. A field of dying men and horses were banished from Wylis' ears in an instant, as the blood drained from his face and fear clenched his heart and squeezed the words out inch by inch.

"Kamber... my father?"

The ser pressed his lips together in a hard, bloodless line. His gaze flickered away only for a moment before he met his Lord again. He'd made plenty of vows, but the only one he held true was the one he'd never spoken: loyalty to his family. Now his lord had to be appraised of the truth, and he would do so. 

"Much has come to pass, cousin. I have much to-"

"Does he live?"

"When last I saw," Kamber said gently, noting the faint strum of hysteria in Wylis' face, the sheen to his eyes. "Aye, he lives. Wounded upon the neck by Hosteen Frey after a quarrel, but alive."

Another man screamed close by, wrenching sound cut off quite literally by the heavy _thunk_ of a falling ax a moment later. Wylis cared no longer, and would not lie to himself that he did. These were Frey men; mayhap some or most or _all_ , for what he bloody knew, were among those that slaughtered the Young Wolf and his wife and Wylis' brother and all his damn host at the Red Wedding. His eyes narrowed and his lips curled as he heard the name of one in particular.

"Hosteen. I thought I saw him among this rabble."

"He led it, that is true," Kamber said, mirroring his expression. "Not seen him alive, though. Fortune to us, aye?"

Wylis swept his gaze across the battlefield. At Ser Oprey's last count, over fifty of their men would be left behind to stiffen and freeze and be buried by the snow with the men that killed them; wait for long months or years before Spring returned and their bloated bodies could be found and buried. Wylis grimaced at the idea, but they had little choice. Just like the butchery of the dying and wounded who could not ride, they were grim necessities of their course. A few score of others would need to be loaded onto the supply carts and likely many of them would freeze or die of rot to their wounds...

The young lord's gaze hardened. He would not have it be for nothing. His father savaged, his brother dead, his men killed...

"Aye," he said, eyes resting on a strange pair of comrades in the middle distance, one kneeling next to the other as he lay. "Fortune, indeed. Now speak, cousin, and spare nothing."

 

**SANSA**

Scarred Face hadn't liked it, but Sansa could have cared less. _Back to the baggage train_ , he'd said, _those are my orders._

"Your orders are to keep me alive," she'd snapped back at him as the battle finally ended, fighting turning to rout turning to slaughter within minutes of Hosteen Frey falling with his guard. Once their commander was no longer around to threaten or abuse them, even Sansa could see all fight vanish from the Frey men. "And that's contingent on you staying with me. You-" she tossed her head in the direction of a young horseman who sat ramrod straight when he realized he was being addressed "-what's your name?"

"L-Lionel, m'lady."

"Lionel, take the others and bring the carts forward. My friend here, will stay by my side."

"What about survivors, m'lady?" Lionel was green, mayhap, but he wasn't stupid. He knew what the role of cavalry was. "Not all the Frey's died on the field or in the river. Some got to the woods."

Sansa sighed through her nose and swept her gaze across the field. She didn't even know if this place had a name. There was little to set it apart, no landmarks or odd formations of earth and stone and water to prompt a mapmaker to add a little something extra to his parchment, or locals to refer to it as anything but "the field by the forest and next to the river". But a thousand men were dead there before her eyes. A thousand lives, ended and bled out onto the earth. She closed her eyes for a moment, and steeled herself to that thought.

_Most of them were your enemies. Had they found you, they would have captured you, raped you and sold you to the highest bidder._

_What did you think war was, girl? Duels and speeches?_

Against all expectation, a wry, wintry smile to match the softly falling snow alighted her face. She heard his voice in that last part. Harsh truths from a harsh man... and gods, she'd seen plenty of _that_ through the morning. But it was with his eyes he saw the freezing landscape, featureless and stripped bare of anything green and living, until the hills and woods and fields stretched out to a grey nothing on the horizon, cloud and land muddling together. 

"Another day, and they'll be dead," she said, spurring her horse with a brusqueness more akin to Sandor than herself. "Winter is _here_ , Lionel. Freys know not how to survive it." The pony belched steam into the sky as it started to gallop, Sansa's eyes fixed on the slowly moving black shape in the midst of the corpses. "Coming, friend?!"

Scarred Face growled something she decided to ignore. He hardly had an enviable duty, but that didn't mean she had to make it easy from him. The battle was over, and she would be from him no longer.

Her face was pinched and set as the wind lashed her, driving hard from the hill to the field, and not just from the weather. She couldn't deny it: she _did_ want to see him. No, not just see him, but do so up close and in detail. See him walking, growling, all his limbs in working order. Run her hands over him and be sure there were no wounds paining him. To look in his eyes and see that same spark from the night before, not the animal ferocity that had surely glowed in them not even a half-hour before.

Snow became mud. Mud stained with red. Not just liquid, but chunks of it. Severed hand and arms and body parts she could not name but still recognized. Bodies wherever she turned, and Sansa wished she could speed past it all as the pony slowed to a cautious trot, and then a wary walk. The ground was too choked with the dead for anything less, and not all of them had passed. Sansa swallowed hard as she saw men, Manderly men, men who followed her and loved her father, moving like wraiths with bored, businesslike expressions, and ended lives as easily as they did gather up abandoned weapons. 

She saw one man shake his head, face crumpled and shaking and wet with tears, grasping weakly at the arms of the man holding him down, lips puckered as he shushed him like a frightened child... then his other hand slid across his throat, silver gleam leaving a red line that soon wept and dripped. The crying man shuddered and his eyes rolled and Sansa looked away as his killer began going through his pockets.

A scene repeated over and over. Sometimes with that same attempt at compassion, sometimes with curses... often with nothing at all. Just one more duty. 

A giant in black armor was ahead of her, kneeling by a man in torn Manderly livery. Something made Sansa pause when she grew close; she could hear fragments over the wind, lilting in through the snow. Words that were a familiar rasp, but without rancor. She could not linger forever, and as she got closer, she saw the bearded face of the man who was lying with his hand over his stomach.

Sandor looked at her briefly, and the question in her eyes. He shook his head.

 

**TYBER**

By the sodding gods, I never thought it'd be a Frey that did me in. Had a good run of it, though, I have to admit. Not a scratch through the charge, when Willum and Roger were killed by those bloody crossbows. Straight through those pikes and nary one snagged me. In the melee, hacking left and right, a bloody stupid old man among boys and still thinking he was invincible.

Left my side open. Damn silly of me. Green mistake. Heh. Fitting. Green mistake for an old campaigner.

Funny, how things end.

Aye. Funny.

I'm lying there holding my guts in and trying not to faint when this shadow looms over me. At first I think it's that old hooded bastard himself, come to claim me. But no: it's a different bastard, just without a hood and probably a worse mug.

"Cle... Clegane..."

"Lord Tyber." He looks down and his lips curl. Not a fool, that one. Knows a mortal wound when he sees it. "Last wound you'll get, I think."

I laugh and it hurts but fuck it, why not? How long have I got for regrets, anyway? It ends with a shudder and I have to grind my teeth hard not to scream. Fucking spear in the side. Wouldn't have torn a hole so big if I hadn't swung around when I killed the bugger holding it, but I wasn't think-

White light. White pain. All of it, everywhere, fuck... fuck, it hurts. Can't speak, can't even breath without fire burning my lungs and my tongue. 

A hand on my shoulder. Strong. Squeezing. I open them and see shining scars and deep brown eyes like my own and a man raised on this kind of carnage. 

"I could speed you."

"Heh..." Funny, that. Vicious sod like him, offering mercy. "What... What'd I do... to deserve that?"

"Spoke well for me," Clegane says simply. Aye, I did at that, but an idiot could have told you the man had skills you didn't waste on a bodyguard when there was a battle to be fought. "And you believed in my lady."

My eyes are swimming and my face is cold and it sinks down to my bones, but the eyes in my mind... remembering... aye... they still work. I see her face flushed and furious as she knocks down Ser Oprey with her words and bats away his objections, the starched bloody fool. Remember Clegane's face flash for a moment to panic before going very, very calm again. Too calm. I manage a smile I hope is knowing, even if it is with bloody lips. He sees it and I could swear I see him turn to hide the flush on his good side.

"Cares about you... your lady," I say, trying to sound sly with too much in my throat. "More'n just... just yer liegewoman, I'd wager."

Clegane's eyes harden and gods, _that's_ funny. Like I'm supposed to be afraid, with half my stomach flopping in my lap. 

"Dangerous thing to say."

"Didnt say... t'wasn't. Said what I'd... wager."

Big bastard actually cracks a smile and hands me a little waterskin. But what burns in my mouth isn't water and I'm grateful for the rich, coarse sweetness as I swallow it. The sky is grey and cloudy, but there's cracks in the wall. Peeks, just hints of brilliant blue. Like my wife's eyes. Poor Agatha. She was always worried this would happen. I sigh and take another last nip of the good stuff.

Last things last, I suppose. Leave begging and scrambling to the men with lives and years left ahead of them. I should have died with the Young Wolf, or with his father. Hells, I should have died fighting with Robert, and back then I was already getting old. 

Would have preferred a better grave, though. Sodding field surrounded by Freys? Hardly the stuff of stories...

I roll my head to one side and manage to hawk something bitter and bloody at what's left of Hosteen Frey's head, now looking more like a brick smashed by a sledgehammer than a granite slab. Clegane's work, if I recall. Bloody sight to see. One man standing against a clutch of horsemen, and surviving. Fine warrior. Fine shield. 

Hosteen. Puffed up prick. Made Oprey look like a fucking septon by comparison. Loved pushing people around, just because he had a title. "Least... I'll be kicking _you_... up the arse... when I go... ya bollocks..."

Aye. Good a time as any. Battle won, but people die on the winning side all the time; sometimes more than the losers. Gods... how many times had I beaten those odds? The Blackfryes, Robert, the Greyjoys, the Lannisters... many-a-time I should have snuffed it. Never so much as nicked by a blade. But at least I get some peace at the end, and not some sticky-fingered little sod from the other side slitting my throat and prying the gold from my teeth. 

Clegane. The Hound. Lady Stark's protector. 

Funny.  

"Time... f'me t'..." A vision behind stern Clegane, and he turns to see it. Sliding down from a horse like a lovely landslide in grey cloth and tumbling curls. I blink and it's the Maiden then I blink again and I'm back. "Lady... Stark?"

"Lord Tyber." She kneels next to Sandor, close enough that all but me can see her hand over his. I laugh. Fucking hurts, but less now. Getting numb. Bad sign. But now, _now_ is when I get to see this secret? Funny. "I'm sorry."

"Why?" I say, managing a hoarse chuckle. "You didn't... stick me. S'what happens to... to old soldiers... my lady, that... that dunno when to... quit solderin'."

"Or they're too bloody stubborn to."

I drag my gaze back to Clegane and wink. With both eyes. Bugger. Fucking muscles in my _head_ are failing me now. "Aye... that, too."

His hand slides to a scabbard and a dagger fills it. The one that'll end me. Her eyes go wide and her mouth parts and I can see the plea before she speaks it and I manage to touch the hem of her dress. Get it muddy and buggery knows what else. But she has to look. She has to know.

"It's alright, lass," I say, voice like I'm talking to my daughter, and I hope Old Ned will forgive me for that. "No fixin' this... this one. Better that-" I glance at the blade "-than eke... ekeing away in... in a cart."

She holds my hand and sucks in her lips, holding back tears. She's such a sweet girl. Harder, for all that she's endured, but still kind-hearted, like I remember.

It feels good to die for a woman like that. A cause that good. No Queen in the North, mayhap... but the Stark's restored, the Bolton's exterminated like rats... and a foolish old man dying as he'd lived.

Lord Wylis is behind them both. Our eyes meet, as much as I can see that far, anyway. He nods, I think. I nod back, and turn my fading eyes to Clegane. The pain's coming in waves now. Harder and stronger and scraping bone with every kiss.

"Now, lad," I say, and notice now how weak it is. "Take care of... yer lady... we love her... All of us." 

"Aye," he says, and gives me a smile that tells me everything. "That I'll do, my lord."

I close my eyes. A muffled sob from that sweet girl. Something mumbled by Clegane I can't make out. A prayer from Wylis that I can. Then there's a crunching clank of metal moving fast, chainmail rustling-

Pain. A spike of it, sharp in my chest until it bursts and my head falls back-

-into a pool of warm, dark water. The sky is grey and it turns black. I'm floating in it. Can't feel anything. I could be an ant or a giant, I don't know which.

But it doesn't hurt anymore. I fade away to something else. 

I hope Agatha's waiting for me.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gah! Don'tcha just hate it when you see an epic, moving, sweeping, cinematic, inspiring movie and then have to go home and bang out a filler chapter? Welp, hope you enjoy it anyway, guys! Oh, and go see "Battle Of The Five Armies"...
> 
> *waits a few seconds then starts firing the gun in the air*
> 
> NOW, DAMN YER EYES AND YER GUTS AND YER ADORABLE FEETIES! I assume they're adorable, anyway...


	20. Chapter 20

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *happy sigh, finishes Wendy's burger and wiggles butt into a comfortable groove at the table*
> 
> Nothing better than a whole week off work, with no engagements save thrashing out all the plot twists, character developments, dialogue, romance, bloodshed, scheming and scenery churning around my noggin. 
> 
> Well, there are, but allow me SOME hyperbole...

**JONELLE**

The visits were getting easier, but that wasn't saying much. _Perhaps_ , she thought, _they are just changing in their tone. Weeping grief and mourning cannot last forever. Your eyes must turn to the future, whatever it may be._

The woman looked up at the solitary weirwood in the corner of the castle, surrounded by a clutch of elm and young cedar. Her father had called it a godswood and mayhap he was right, but "garden" always struck her as more accurate. However large or small it was, the thick white trunk crowned with bloody-hand leaves made it more than just another clump of trees. She gazed into the face that had been half-smiling at the world for as long as the Starks and the Cerwyns and all the rest had existed, one eye almost winking as if hinting a secret only it knew.

Their bones were in the crypt, but this was where she thought of them. Her brother practicing with sword and shield under the bleeding eyes; her father patting her on the back and talking in that soft, calm voice that could quiet a band of wildings, telling her tales of forest sprites and direwolves and ice daemons.

The memories rushed back to her again and she felt the burning behind her eyes. Gods, it always came to this. No matter how studious she guarded her feelings, these visits always ended with her smearing hot, shameful wetness of her round and rosy cheeks. _Be strong_ , she thought, and heard her father's voice in that white wood mouth. _It shouldn't have fallen to you, but it has. Remember our words. Remember your family. You are more than a girl, now._

Her jaw jutted a little as she set it, eyes still shining but now with intent, not grief. More than intent, actually. She saw the red sap oozing from those unblinking eyes and imagined, for the hundredth, blasphemous time, that they were those of Ramsay Bolton's, or his father's. Weeping blood and shit and agony from every fucking orifice while every house in the North gathered around to mock and tear them. A traitor's death, one well-deserved.

Her father had died in the South. Her soft-spoken but hard-willed liege, who waved at her with a broad smile as he rode to war, like he'd only be a fortnight and return with gifts from King's Landing like he had when she was a girl. Instead he'd come back with a Cerwyn banner covering him, emaciated in death to speak of starvation and pain.

Her brother followed less than a year later. Killed when the Bastard took Winterfell by savage treachery, which was only uncovered after. Her strong brother, always seeking to be his father and yet always remembering the names of the servants... taking an arrow in the eye and dying like a _man_ , gods damn it. 

Leaving her alone. A maid at two-and-thirty and forever cloaked in mourning black and endless, roiling hatred under her ladylike countenance. 

Jonelle lowered her head and felt the tears rallying. So much to do. So much she's had to swallow. Walking to Winterfell, that place of strength and pride and honor, to swear fealty to that bloodless monster Roose, with his leering son at his side, truly his father's spawn only with half the brains and even less restraint. She'd sent off boys from her lands, lads she knew and had grown up with, to be commanded by that Bastard and wage war on her own kingdom. But never... never had she dared refuse. The scarce hundred men she had remaining at the castle were a piddling nuisance compared to the force the Boltons would punish her with.

_Enough have died... and yet, still... you turned the Freys away._

"Forgive me," she said to the smiling face, that seemed to indulge her, winking through the wafting snowflakes. "I could not. There was... is, nothing else to do. The rations are not enough for a thousand men, and... father, they were _Freys_ , we should not..."

She bit off her angry words and one fleshy hand tightened around the ax at her side. She'd taken to carrying it more often since she'd denied Hosteen Frey and his ragged rabble from access to her castle. They had too desperate a look of broken men to her eyes, as her father had told her about. Men who would strip their hold of everything to guard against hunger and cold, and not care if in the doing, they left those living there to starvation. Jonelle had wanted to tell that square-head moron Hosteen herself, but her steward had insisted. Better to have it come from him, he'd told her with a pat on her arm, in case there were... repercussions.

She snorted. Such a polite and lifeless word. Repercussions. Consequences. Retaliation. Not so staid and blank when they come visiting you. Ask the Reynes and Castameres.

_You can't. That's the point._

Lady Jonelle got to her feet, and by the time she had, she was worthy of the title again. She turned swiftly, faster than a portly woman would be though capable, and found her guard waiting. A trio of hard-faced men a little older than her, who'd asked to stay when Ser Kyle had departed with the bulk of her armed men for Moat Cailin. They did not trust the Boltons, and wanted to stay close to her, "for your father". She had not the heart to deny them, and now, every other day, under the disapproving eyes of her maids and creaking septa, Jonelle changed to breeches and leather shirt and trained with the ax that was her family's sigil.

Double-headed, both of them curved and sharp like dragon's wings in flight. Honed, just like their words. Honed and _ready_ , and by the gods, she _would be_ when her deeds caught up with her.

"Edgin?" She said as they walked back to the castle, pulling her hood tighter as the wind shook more snow from the sky. "Make sure the livestock are in the stables within the hour. The light will fade fast today, I don't want to lose anymore in the cold night."

"The weirwood tell you the Sun'd go down early?"

Such brazen boldness from a lowborn! She could almost hear her dear mother scoff and gasp in scandalized shock. Jonelle narrowed her eyes at Salton, who managed to meet her gaze but kept his lips straight... and his eyes dancing. 

"Mind your tongue," she said, without any heat nor edge, and added as she kept walking: "And it might have, so don't scoff, lackwit."

A chorus of low chuckles and smiles she could _hear_ muffled by hands across the face, rough palms scraping growing stubble. Beards were a common thing among Northmen, but come the Winters, they were a necessity. Every man needed a thick layer of natural protection swaddling half their face, and her guards were working on their own. Jonelle reached up and smoothly sheathed her ax across her back. At first it had taken her three, maybe four hesitant, separate movements, and half the time she missed the sodding sheath and it fell and nearly cut her bloody ankles off. But now it was one, practiced movement, along with a brief, preparatory tugging to make it all the easier to draw again. 

Behind her and flanking her, the three men-at-arms exchanged glances and smiled with quiet pride. Their lady learned quickly.

"My lady?!"

All eyes flashed to the tower tower that peaked the castle, and one of her men pointing and shouting.

"A host approaches! Hundreds on horse! Carts, as well!" 

"Banners?!"

"I... I can't..." The voice went from booming to quiet, hesitant, and Jonelle could almost see the boy squinting and narrowing and trying to channel the eyes of an eagle into those of a crofter's son. "Wait... green man... but with a tail... on... white-"

"Manderly," Jonelle shouted back, and quietly thanked her bulk for blessing her with a voice that could jolly well carry, instead of a thin, reedy, womanly trill. "Stand your post, boy!" She turned to Edgin and the others and their eyes were resigned. Not afraid, but... calm. The calm a man on the gallows may have had. "We knew this day might come. You know what to do. Salton, with me. You-"

"Y'had the right of it, m'lady," Castor said with his usual rubbing-stones growl, fierce and fatal look in his eyes. "We know what t'do. Boy? Make sure yeh watch the lady."

"I'm only three years younger than you!"

"Aye, and still strugglin' t'grow a beard."

"You know-"

"Gentlemen," Jonelle said briskly, casting a long, lingering look around the three of them. They were putting her at ease, she knew it. "To arms. And to ready. Salton?"

He followed her dutifully as men starting shouting and their shouts birthed a slew of cries and crashes of feet and doors and ringing bells and thus all was activity and bedlam. Jonelle strode through it in silence, boots slapping hard on stone as she climbed the battlement to the front gate. A young squire with fuzz on his cheeks was sharpening a shortsword and she patted him on the shoulder. 

"Fly our colors, boy," she said, nodding to the flagpole next to him as if it were of utmost importance. "Let them see our words and our sigil."

Our words. Our sigil. That bought a light to his eyes and fire to his hands. Lady Jonelle did not begrudge it of the lad; all within were facing an army for her, most likely, and none were fleeing or hiding or trying to squirm their way beyond the walls and to safety. They stayed, for her and her father and her brother. She laid her hands on the gap-toothed stoneworks above the gate and stared coldly at the liveried horde riding slowly towards them, following the river snaking up from the south. The colors of Manderly were raised in a half-dozen places, and emblazoned on nearly every rider.

 _No siege pieces_ , she thought to herself, stilling the quiver of fear with her cold, calm observations. _No ladders, nor rams... gods, they mean to starve us out. Surround us until we surrender._

The snow didn't so much hide them as blurred them. She could see carts wobbling and trundling like great wheeled mammoths pulled by donkeys and oxen. Scores, hundreds of men swaddled in furs and cloaks around their armor, by now icy just to the touch, with lances skyward as if they meant to charge the heavens. They rode in a thick, broad line, and as they neared and the curtains of snow grew thin...

 _Five hundred fighting men, by the looks of it. Gods... and what have we? Perhaps a hundred? Less?_ Her jaw tightened and she fingered the handle of the ax over her shoulder. Her father's words came back to her, spoken from that very spot years before. _In a siege, one defender is worth ten usurpers. They must climb tall, strong walls, batter through iron-ribbed gates, all under a barrage of arrows, bolts, rocks, oil and spears. They have to exhaust themselves. The man inside has only to cut them down when they approach. Provisioned and prudent, even a fractional force could hold his castle for months._

Lady Jonelle breathed deep and icy air filled her lungs, the freezing shock of it chasing the lukewarm unease from her stomach. Lessons were all well and good. Now came time to put them into practice. She swept her eyes from side to side, and saw her "garrison", if that were even accurate, rushing over the walls and stack quivers, arrows, rocks and spears near murder holes. A burning, cloying smell like molten leather washes over her and she turns to see two men waddling with a cauldron of boiling... something, between them, positioning it over the gate. Pitch, maybe? Tar? Water with chunks of hot leather in it? 

_Do we even **have** any pitch?_

"Why don't they fly the flayed man?"

She turned back and saw Salton staring out at the approaching force, frow furrowed. "Not a Bolton banner among 'em. Nor Frey. Just Manderly. If they'd come from Win-from _them_ ," he said, biting off the name of their true lord's home before he could finish. No. Winterfell was a sacred word, and would be spoken again with Starks in its walls. Bolton and his Bastard and his scum had no claim to it. It was... just where they happened to be. "Surely they'd be flying _their_ banners, too. Let us know it was them."

Jonelle had to agree, but the Boltons had proved to all they were masters of treachery. She saw green and white mermen and maybe that was what she was _supposed_ to see. Every man jack down there could be Dreadfort bastards. 

Then they stopped. Five hundred little avalanches in the snow ceased moving, ceased cutting lines of mud and blackened white through the landscape, and halted before her gate. Closer now, she could see the signs of recent battle. Dressings marring bright livery, along with splashes of blood and mud. Helmets made awkward by white slashes of gauze under them, and a few grim-faced men with their arms in slings, still bent on riding and fighting anyway. 

Jonelle blinks, the idea striking her like a hammer. No... No, it was... would Lord Wyman be so bold? So open in his defiance? She supposed it were possible: he'd always seemed a foolish sort, always carousing and boasting and laughing so hard every one of his many bellies wobbled. 

_I turn away the Freys and they **flee** south... and now a Manderly host comes **from** the south, and freshly bloodied. _

Three riders rode forward at a slow canter, and Jonelle heard archers on the walls nock arrows. She held up a hand and all along the watchtowers, men both scared and resolved heeded her warning. Not yet. Not during parlay. 

"Lady Jonelle of House Cerwyn! Do you not know me?!"

The man that addressed was stout where his father was simply fat, with drooping side moustaches and flat, haunted eyes of a man who had seen too much of killing. Jonelle leaned forward a fraction, through whirling swirls of snow that ever-hindered her eyes. A memory stirred. A visit to White Harbor and a man without such hardness in his gaze.

"I'd know you better for a name!"

"Lord Wylis! Son of Wyman!"

"You are a fair distance from the white stones and surf of your home, my lord! Judging by company, I would say it is not a casual jaunt!"

The man chuckled on his horse and the figures at either side of him were still, watchful. One was a great brute of a man clad in black, atop a black stallion, with black hair lashed over half of his face, not quite hiding livid scars that Jonelle could see even from her perch. He carried something under his arm in a burlap sack, and his face seemed etched from angry stone, never to move. The other seemed like a woman, slim and light on a white pony, hood and cloak pulled tight so only her red cheeks and blue eyes-

Jonelle blinked again. More recollections. Blue eyes... what was that... _Tully_ eyes? 

"Aye, my lady! Nothing more bracing than a ride in the snow with your fellows... and refusing a few who'd seek undue _tolls_ along the way!"

Lady Cerwyn couldn't help but grin. That was the Wylis she remembered. Jovial and booming as his father, but far more physical, eager to brawl and test the strength of muscles hidden under rolls of fat. Now he seemed fleshy of face but there was... something had happened to him. Something horrible. Even as he made his jape about the Freys and their endless, grasping, griping about their damned tolls over their precious fucking bridge, she could see humor came hard to him. A suit he'd not worn in a long while. 

"I did likewise the day past," she shouted back to him, still keeping her hand raised when they walked a few more horse-lengths closer. "Only I did not need to bloody myself, not with walls beneath my feet!"

"Fortune to you, then, lady!" Wylis shouted up at her, patting his sword. " _These_ were our only bars to the Stranger!"

"What seek you, Wylis? Why bring a host to my castle?"

"Only to seek shelter from the stom, my lady. The night closes fast and we would build our tents leaning on your walls, have our wounded in the warm," his words came loud but fast, and he touched on the point that she feared most before it had fully formed in her own mind. "We have our rations, my lady! Every man is provisioned! The Freys had no need of them, after we were done..."

Gods, but she wanted to trust him. Her heart fluttered like when she was a girl engaging some girlish fancy. What did this all mean? Was there now real, active resistance against the Boltons, aside from Stannis? She knew the Baratheon claimant had landed in the North, fought off a wildling invasion at the Wall and now was bearing down on WInterfell, gathering strength for a siege. Lady Jonelle was far from stupid: she could see that Stannis had no real interest in the North, but that was where he could rally the support he would need for any attempt on the Iron Throne, and... from what she had heard, anyway... he thought it as his duty. To protect the defences of the Wall, when they were so close to overwhelmed.

_No other force but his own dared stand, though. All houses bent the knee to Bolton or Baratheon, there was no middle ground. So what now...?_

"Fine words, Lord Wylis," she said, and could not keep the note of sadness from her voice. She hated how mistrust seemed the currency of her years. "But I cannot risk these gates being opened. Your father bent the knee to Bolton. Your bannerman-"

"Those knights that rode with my father," Wylis said, cutting her off and sweeping a hand behind him. "Are now _here_ , with _me_ , Lady Jonelle. They have deserted Bolton. My father was savaged by Hosteen Frey in a quarrel, and Roose kept him hostage and sent the Frey and my father's men out to deal with Stannis. Stannis was not so easily dealt with, as it turned out. The Manderly men abandoned the Freys, and I'll not hear any words of "traitor" or "turncoat" launched at those left _they_ who _slaughtered_ our Young King at the Twins!"

His voice turned harsh and ugly at the last part, threat clear and nigh-frothing. Jonelle could not bring herself to think the opposite. How could one think in terms of treachery when it came to the treacherous? It was alike to thieving from a thief: a vaguely defined but oddly righteous settling of accounts. She nodded and looked across the faces of the men seeking entry to her castle. Finally... she shook her head.

"Lord Wylis... forgive me, but I cannot. My people trust me to defend and protect them, and opening these gates..."

Wylis seemed to be listening, but he turned for a moment to nod curtly at his side. The two other riders moved forward smoothly in front of him, some stratagem or decision already made before they'd even come within sight of the castle, she'd wager. She watched with narrowed, wary eyes as the woman reached up and-

Burnished hair that blew and whipped around a pale head. A flash of fire that was one of memory, too, and Jonelle's mouth opened and her breath hitched in surprise.

The Great Hall at Winterfell, years before. That same girl, before womanhood had given her curves and height and sharpened her features... but that hair, there was no mistaking it. Not her mother's, but when she spoke, Jonelle thought of Cateyln.

"Lady Jonelle?! Do you not know the daughter of Eddard Stark?!"

"I... I do!" She managed to stammer out the words and shook he head, leaning forward now, as far as she dared, as if doing so would somehow grant her greater clarity from thirty feet in the air. "I... We... Lady Sansa, we heard you were in Kings Landing! Trapped and accused-"

"A long tale for a time we are not all _freezing_ , my lady," she said back, and flashed a smile that was all her father, in those moments Ned Stark's taciturn mask slipped. "I feared you would not trust Lord Wylis! I understand! But I speak for him, I vouch for him, and without him, we would not have gone so far! And to answer one of yours questions... how I came to be here..."

She turned away from the last rider, the giant on the stallion that constantly shook its shaggy mane and blasted steam into the air. The man cantered forward and gods, he managed to make that seem almost like a strut. He stopped below the gates and looked up. Jonelle's eyes widened and she gasped. Gods... what happened to his face?

"This man saved me, Lady Jonelle! And..." Sansa's voice hesitated, but did not break. Jonelle flashed a glance at her and saw unease disturb those beautiful but frozen features, then vanish again, like ripples from a thrown stone running their course. "... if you need further proof of our intentions..."

The scarred man reached into the sack, and held up something that was once a whole human head. It was no longer thus, but there was enough of a face, silently groaning with eyes rolled back and grey matter frozen leaking through it's shattered skull, to be recognized as Hosteen Frey.

"My own work, m'lady," the man shouted up in a voice that made Castor's sound like a minstrel's. " _Now're_ y'gonna open the gates?"

 

**SANSA**

"Aye, Stannis smashed 'em west of the village."

"And the rest of the Freys?"

"Bloody fingers are like ice. No, just gimme the candle."

"Dead by the Knife. Gods alone knows how they managed to get that far south without all freezing solid... girl?! More wine, here!"

"What of Bolton? How many men has me at the castle?"

"Some four thousand, I'd say. Aye, I know, Lady Cerwyn, a fearsome number. There's a few hundred Umber, same of Cassel and Mormont, other houses sent men, but they're all _twitching_ for a chance to turn on them. Umber's are only there because the Greatjon remains hostage at the Twins. The rest march with Stannis."

"This pork? Give some here, lad..."

"Do we know _anything_ of Stannis' force?"

"Only that he's encamped at the crofter's village half a day's ride from Winterfell, Lady Stark. Well, it _was_ half a day. Now, with the snow and the blizzards... I'd say two, perhaps three. Never had a seen a Winter with such bitterness, and-"

"I know he recruited the mountain clans, they have thousands living in the highlands below the wall-"

"Aye, true enough, Lady Stark, but we don't know how many. Not that it matters."

"I see, Ser Kamber. Divided, neither we nor Stannis could retake Winterfell. But together..."

"Then there would be hope."

"Got enough in my mug, girl. Off y'go..."

Sansa turned from the bursts of intelligence flying across the table to see Sandor standing at the wall behind her, cup held easily in his still-armored hand. He'd shed none of it since they'd arrived, though at least he'd scrubbed off the worst of the viscera that had covered him. Cerwyn Hall was filled with soldiers, exhausted Manderly horsemen and excited Cerwyn men-at-arms, demanding every scrap of news they could manage. The Manderly men just wanted to munch their rations and sleep like corpses, but Sansa had noticed that the mood was warm, both in tone and temperature.

_Everyone is glad to be alive. Glad that war did not have to come to them twice in one day._

She swallowed and her eyes flicked back to Sandor, studiously sober as he watched her back. 

_... almost everyone._

She wanted to speak to him. She wrung her hands in her lap, meal of mutton and beets was forgotten despite her hunger. Everytime Sandor entered her thoughts now, or even her eyes, she didn't see her sworn shield, nor the man that had kissed her or touched her with such tenderness. She saw the towering, blood-splattered engine of decimation that had grinned as he hacked men in twain. That _relished_ the charge, the melee, the hideous rending of flesh. Sansa had told herself, over and over, that he was a _warrior_ , and that was what he _did..._ but the _joy_ he took from it-

"Lady Stark? Are you well, dear?"

She turned again and found Lady Jonelle's concerned eyes boring into her own. She smiled shakily and looked down at her plate. She knew that it was a fine meal by the stores of the castle, their provisions carefully rationed to last as long as they could. Sansa had tried to protest along with Wylis but Jonelle had put her foot down and that was that: they were honored guests, slayers of their enemies, and however humble the fare, they deserved a feast that night. 

Sansa didn't even try to hide her admiration. This plump, homely woman, who could never be mistaken for some story-tale princess, holding her ground against noble lords and... why? For gain and conquest and vanity? No. To feed guests under her roof. Now she felt hideous as she looked down at a man's ration's for a whole day, and knew she could not finish it. 

"No, Lady Jonelle, I... what I mean to say... I appreciate the food, truly, but-"

The woman sighed but did so with a smile, reaching over the clasp her hand. Green eyes that pierced and _understood_ without any feeling of violation winked at her. 

"Don't fret, dear. After what _you_ saw yesterday, I'd say your appetite is hardly scratching at your stomach, hmm?"

Sansa managed a laugh, breathless and only half-humored, but... relieved. Gods, it had seemed like seasons since she'd laughed or smiled, though it had been only a day. Her thoughts and memories would not leave her be, and she... her face scrunched and her eyes screwed shut... she felt _fear_ , that Sandor would be so close to her when she slept, in her room, mayhap in her _bed_ , and in her dreams-

Jonelle squeezed a little harder, and when Sansa opened her eyes, the lady's own were harder, steady, an anchor for her moorless feelings. They pierced deeper now and Sansa feared again, knew that her revulsion and foreboding would be written across her face. But instead the woman just smiled and patted her hand, suddenly feeling so delicate under those stubby, solid digits. 

"A good night will aid thee, Lady Stark," she said, then lowered her eyes to roll them just for her, and glanced pointedly at the men hunched over plates and cups and pointing fingers. "But until _then_..."

Another laugh, this time fuller. Sansa had learned much of men and of war in such a short time, but as necessary as they were, she regarded them still with a feminine eye. So often they seemed like boys grown larger, sketching out maps and battle plans with cups and cutlery, salt shakers and scraps of bread. She can see the light in their eyes, the eagerness as they spin plans and exchange information, as if war were some grand game without blood or death (for the winners, anyway). 

But she does not close her ears. Sansa watches and listens, and she learns. Information, Baelish had taught her, was the most crucial currency in existence. With the right knowledge at the right time, a man could overturn a kingdom. Her teeth ground for a moment as his grin and his sharp, neat teeth filled her eyes. Oh, and he would know about that, after all...

At least there was one other who appreciated her thoughts. Though by the looks of Lady Jonelle, hands of one finger tapping the edge of the table in a constant, restless tattoo, and the other gripped around a head of the ax next to her chair, she looked...

 _Like Sandor_ , she thought.

"Ser Kamber," she said clearly, and loudly, and the knight glanced her way with his mouth half-open, about to answer a question from Wylis. "You say the village is half a day from Winterfell, but would likely take two or three days now. I remember this castle is roughly that distance. Could we reach Stannis, then, in that time?"

The ser blinked a few times and Sansa struggled not to roll her eyes. _Gods, show a man a woman who can talk of more than embroidery and dresses and he looks at you like you've just grown an extra head._

"I... er, yes, Lady Sansa, that _could_ be accomplished."

"Good." Then she turned to Lord Wylis, aware now that he, and Oprey, Kamber and a handful of other knights and lords at their table were now focused on her. But it was Jonelle's surprised, curious stare that spurred her onward. "We should rest here tonight, restore our strength and tend the wounded we can. Then we must leave when the Sun is highest and make for the village."

Ah, didn't _that_ cause quite the eruption? Sansa glanced from face to face as bemusement turned to sputtering and whispering and male gaze from male gaze shifting here and there and silently questioning, _who is this girl to order us so?_   But, she noted with a tiny smirk just pricking at her lips, they were mainly coming from the knights that had joined them that day. Wylis just nodded slowly to himself, and Oprey chewed sullenly. 

"Lady Stark," Kamber finally said, spreading his palms to encompass her, the table, the room, the castle. "Our men need longer. We have scores of wounded and they cannot move. We cannot leave them here, it will only invite swifter starvation-"

"Which is why they will come with us, in the carts, as they arrived, ser."

"With us?!" Kamber's protest reached a screech, both in surprise and to rise over the hubbub. Now even Wylis was looking at her in shock. Oprey seemed to be choking. She was sure Sandor would like that. "B-But, Lady Stark, we go into harsher weather, towards a possible enemy-"

"Stannis will find no enemy in Lord Wylis, yourself or myself. He will find an ally and a fresh force ready to join his own. The men cannot stay here, that is true, but I will _not_ have this place become a tomb and a killing ground for men who were well enough to travel, not just be gifted with _mercy_ on the battlefield they survived. They _will_ come with us. We will provide for them as best we can-"

She'd put enough edge in her voice for every word to strike sparks, but it was Wylis who interrupted her. As gently as he could, but sliding in nonetheless. "Lady Stark, several of them died traveling her today. Many more will die over three days journey, with us traveling so slowly and through worse weather. I do not dispute your plan to meet with Stannis, but the wounded..." He shook his head, and Sansa saw not an arrogant desire to cut down her plan and replace it, but an honest man's appraisal of a flawed strategy. "They won't survive. One by one, they will freeze and starve, and forgive me, but we will need to waste precious rations on men who cannot fight and will only burden us."

Sansa searched for a rebuttal, but... but... she looked down at her plate. He was right, and there was nothing else to it. The wounded would be always be a burden, whether on the march or in the castle. Nothing could prevent that. Many were capable of riding and thus fighting, but there were two score, perhaps more, who were lashed to carts and jostled around with every turn of the wheel and cried and begged and... they couldn't go. But they couldn't stay.

She looked at Sandor and his face remained immobile. His lips were a white line of inner tension but he could not express it. Only when he tilted his head forward and the long, lank hair on his burned side drifted over his face did his eyes become softer. He understood her... just as he understood necessity. There was a tiny shake of his head, and Sansa turned to the men.

Gods, that was the moment she truly hated. Not the fact she was wrong - she was not a god, of course she made mistakes - but the fact that she'd just confirmed for these old man how _unsuitable_ she was at _this_ table, making _these_ decision, _daring_ to have the same authority as a man. Already she could imagine mutters and jests later on when she retired. Oh- _ho_ , young lady trying to fit into her Daddy's boots, is she? Glad she got some sense talked into her. Best leave it to _us men_. 

Sansa wanted to stab something. But she had to accept reality, and she opened her mouth to-

"They will stay. Under my house's protection."

Lady Jonelle spoke up, and the atmosphere of male triumph died a quick death. 

"M-My Lady?"

"We have ample supplies for..." She pouted a little and looked skyward as she did some invisible arithmetic. "I would say three months, and that is for close to two hundred souls. Two score or so will not burden us by too much, since the Knife is but a stone's throw away and still fat with fish, the ice not covering it yet." A half-dozen mouths opened against her and she charged on relentlessly. Even Sandor raised a pair of impressed eyebrows. " _And_ especially since we will be receiving fresh supplies, as is practical, when Winterfell is retaken and Bolton retaliation is no longer a concern."

Alright, so even Sansa was not expecting _that_ part... but she felt the smile creep and bloom and spread across her face until it was a grin. Oh. Oh, _that_ was good...

"M-Lady Jonelle," Ser Oprey began, shaking his head and unwisely using a tone one devised for talking your wife from a costly purchase at the market. "That... That is a heavy risk, and there is no-"

"You mean to say you will _not_ succeed, ser?" Jonelle's words lashed out like whips and every man at the table was suddenly at attention. Outrage clouded their eyes but then wary, knowing understanding overwhelmed it. The serving girls busied themselves with plates and cups, buzzing around them like hummingbirds from Dorne. Sansa heard Sandor drain his own and then hand it away. Curious. Only his second for the evening. "That you will _not_ join with Stannis and liberate Winterfell, Lady Stark's birthright? You will _not_ revenge ourselves against the Bolton scum that have wounded each of us." She turned her gaze to Wylis, familiar surge of loathing flashing in her eyes. "Your brother. My brother. Dead by Frey and Bolton. You say they will _not_ be brought to heel?"

"Lady Jonelle, it is not so-"

"Yes. We will."

Lord Wylis spoke. His face was a granite mask now, walrus moustache spilling down his cheeks seeming to bristle at her words. His eyes found hers and he nodded. 

"The Lady Cerwyn speaks the truth, my lords and sers. We never wanted the damn southrons game of thrones, but now we have our own... and the rules are the same. We win and crush our enemies with Stannis, or they destroy us instead... which will include this castle and all who reside in it, whether they be Cerwyn or Manderly or passing through." 

Sansa saw Jonelle's ample bosom heave at those words, a touch of dread creeping into her firm expression. She flicked a glance at Wylis and saw some dark satisfaction in his eyes. That seemed almost cruel for him, bringing such a thing to words before her... or was it more than that? Was he warning her, perhaps? Baelish would know. He was so adept at schemes and manipulations and reading people, finding everyone's lever and twisting it until they were broken and thrown away. 

"All the more reason," Lady Jonelle said carefully, "For you and your fellows to succeed."

Lord Wylis slapped the table and lurched to his feet, heavy oak table scraping loud enough to carry across the hall. As his bulk rose to the fore like a great balloon, hundreds of eyes turned to regard him, and he to them, voice the boom that had carried across the courtyard at New Castle days before.

"Men of Manderly! Men of Cerwyn! Tonight, we will eat and sleep and prepare for our march come the morrow! The wounded that cannot ride will stay here, under the safety and protection of our host, Lady Jonelle Cerwyn..." 

He raised a hand her way and at once hundreds of fists were pounding on tables, knocking over empty cups and sending tremors through the floor and the walls and the deafening noise was only dwarfed by the cheers that followed. Jonelle rose with the grace of royalty and nodded her thanks to the men. Sansa watched her closely; she'd never imagined that she would idolize one who was not fair and winsome, like she had Cersei long ago, but now?

"So eat well! Drain your cups! Then retire to the warmth and prepare to have your parts frozen off!"

A gust of laughter from the men, and mayhap Wylis thought it prudent not to mention that, by his odds, with so many men in the room, some of them _would_ be losing their First Sword at some point. Ah, well. Best not to dwell on it. The men were happy, and even the weary-eyed Manderly men were managing smiles, swapping stories even as the first few started to trickle out of the hall, staggering for rest under stone walls for a change, or in a comfy tent snuggled up to the walls. Sansa smiled at her lord and bowed her head as low as she could while seated. He nodded back and then before his arse had even rubbed the chair-

"My lord, this may be a mistake-"

"Wylis, the castle cannot maintain-"

"Lady Jonelle has reassured us as to that score, fellows," Wylis said with a polite sip of his wine, smacking his lips delightedly. "Our choices were dragging the wounded with us to die in the cold or leaving them here to aid in the starvation of an entire castle. That was but a minute or two past. Now she has provided us a third option, and we shall embrace it. When we leave tomorrow, we will be a force unhindered by wounded groaning in our carts, nor men who do naught but consume."

Oprey and Kamber had nowhere to turn, and they knew it. Sansa could see the defeat in their faces, their eyes flickering back and forth into nothing, as if studying some invisible scroll for an answer. Finally Oprey sighed and turned to Jonelle, nodding solemnly.

"Then we shall leave a fair portion of our rations, Lady Jonelle."

"Ser Oprey, that is-"

"Madam, we foraged plenty from the Freys, and with our wounded here, we will have several score of horses without riders with us." The knight shrugged his shoulders and managed an embarrassed half-smirk. "Can't say I much like the taste, given I've been riding the beasts all my life, but each of them is hundreds of pounds of moving meat, m'lady. If we need to, we can slaughter a few and feed our men, and still have enough to replace those lost in battle."

Lord Wylis observed with a cold eyes, caught Jonelle's... and there was another nod between them.

"Then I accept your offer, Ser Oprey."

"My thanks, Lady Cerwyn..."

Sansa didn't need to look behind her: she could _hear_ Sandor's eyes rolling in his head. But she also saw the look that Wylis gave Jonelle once they were eating and plotting again, talking about troop movement and numbers and battlements of Winterfell. Kamber was a font of information and was spilling as much as he could, trying to map it out on the table with rude props and his own hands. Wylis rose his cup to his lips and stared... and stared... until Jonelle met his look.

And he rose the cup in a quick toast, but not before giving her a lopsided smirk, eyes shining with knowing and appreciative understanding. Sansa knew that look very well. It bespoke one thing: _Well played, my lady._  

Jonelle studied the inside of her own cup for a moment, then dropped her lips to drink... just slowly enough for her own answering smile and glittering eyes to meet Wylis'. By the time his men had noticed his attention was elsewhere, the moment had passed and Wylis was all ears and pointed questions again, the little exchange unseen by all but Sansa. Jonelle saw her stare and gave a single toss of her hair, eyes twinkling and most certainly _not_ modest. 

_To the hells with Cersei. **This** is a woman worthy following._

_Aye, and what have **you** done, exactly?_

Gods, she didn't need that harassing, bitter little splash of bile dribbling into her head. She still couldn't eat, though, and as a serving maid passed, face gaunt and eyes roving occasionally over the table, she came to a decision-

"Girl? Come here..."

The wench approached with her eyes downcast, earthen jug of weak wine pressed to her chest. "M'lady?"

"Here..."

The girl looked up and blinked over and over. There was a highborn offering her a plate of food. There was mutton and stewed beets and thick, crusty bread and... was that gravy? She looked up and studied Sansa as if to find the madness that afflicted her, but all she would see were earnest blue eyes and a small smile. It was such a small thing, a meal from one woman to another, but Sansa wouldn't feel that wriggling claw of unease until this was done.

_You cannot do much, but you can still do it._

"Are... does m'lady wish for more-"

"I wish for you to have this. I'm not hungry," she said, and as the maid started to shake her heads, a lifetime of service overriding her survival, Sansa continued, voice lowly. "I know this would be food for a whole day for you. And mayhap... there is someone you could share it with?"

So much could be expressed with a look. The way it could ripple from the dark pits of the eyes, into the colors, spread across the face. The wench looked up and she really _looked_ at Sansa, without guard or fear. Her lips pressed into a shy smile and then turned down and she hid her face, but her blush was brilliant under the flaring torches of the hall. A season of furtive embraces in the kitchens or the laundry, mayhap a night stolen in the stables or, for real luxury, in a tent next to the Knife, all of it unfolded as her face creased and smiled. 

"Mayhap, m'lady..."

" _More_ than mayhap, I think," Sansa said, and the girl took the plate. "Go. I'm fine for now."

The girl went, but not before casting a look at Jonelle, and Sansa noticed that the giddy humor in her eyes froze when she did. She was a girl, she was offered something, and by a highborn, but she was not _Sansa's_ girl, and before anything else, her Lady had to give her permission. The Lady Cerwyn stared between the two of them, taking her time... then waved a hand dismissively.

"Go on, Celie," she said, then whispered as she passed close by, "Don't have that lad up all night."

Celie's face matched the beets as she scuttled quickly from the room and Sansa and Jonelle laughed together and she forgot the bloody nightmare of the frozen field by the river. Only one thing was missing and she looked up at Sandor, finding the giant they used to call "The Hound", that she'd fled from and cringed from, looking down at her and shaking his head, bewilderment on his face. 

"Not hungry, little bird?"

Sansa kept the smile bright, not giving away why her appetite had fled. The way he looked at her... like she was some glorious puzzle he could not fathom and yet was all the more intrigued to solve... that washed away what she had seen that morning. She shrugged and said, "Not really."

Sandor sighed, and by the torches she saw an indulgent smile twist his face as he straightened at his post, resuming his vigil.

"You'll be better for the food come the morning, m'lady."

"So will she."

That look again. Confused but... she couldn't place it. It had marred his eyes before when he'd looked at her, and still she had no better word. Then he looked away, leaving her to her pondering, sipping at her watered wine until weariness weighed on her eyelids and she would need to excuse herself. And as she walked the halls to her room for the night, with her sworn shield never more than a stride ahead of her, she would flicker up at his broad back and guess...

_'Tis almost like wonder._

 

**SANDOR**

_Such a girl... how has she survived so long so good in her heart?_

Sandor asked himself that often, and always the question was followed with a twisting in his guts that had little to do with her, and all to do with _him_. The girl trailing behind him down the hall was... lovely. Body and soul. She _cared_ for people, not even her _own_ people, and he still could not understand how she could give so freely. In thirty years he'd never seen a highborn lady hand away her meal; no, actually _insist_ on it. Cersei... she had always been his benchmark for nobility, low as it was set. She would sooner feed her scraps to dogs than have a serving girl to them, even if she was a starving thing like Celie had been. He watched his little bird breach a lifetime of barriers and just like that, in an instant, with a handful of soft words, the girl would be hers forever. She would tell her friends, her family, her children, how the beauty from House Stark, in the long back past, had given her a meal in the grip of Winter, and took so little for herself.

_And you. What would you have done, dog?_

The big man winced and was glad she could not see his face. That voice... it was almost Joffrey's. Gregor's. Reminding him of what he was, what he had done. There was no softness to him; no generosity or strength of soul. His past loomed large and it was not just his nightmarish face. He thought of Sansa's sister. The wolfgirl. How crude and selfish he'd been, teaching her hard lessons that brooked no mercy, no sympathy. He'd hurled the same hardness at Sansa countless times, but he'd never broken her.

How they were at her chambers and he stood at the side of the door. Looking down on her. Onto those high, sculpted cheekbones and that mouth made of ovals. Into blue eyes weary but still... oddly expectant.  

_What by the heavens and hells and dirt in between do you see in this killer, girl?_

"You are not coming in?"

His mouth worked silently for a moment. He massaged the hilt of his sword, his old worry stone when his words did not match his mouth. For a moment he looked away and found an answer and-

Then she touched his arm. His eyes snapped to it, then traveled up her arm and to her face. Her smile flickered, almost uncertain. Something warred in here. Some hesitation he could not place... though he would know, if he but asked himself. 

He still stank of other men's gore. The grisly evidence was washed from him but the stench remained, and not just in his nose. His heart had hammered and thumped after the battle, the heady high of killing undeniable. He'd drained a wineskin in the aftermath, surrounded by the corpses and those soon-to-be, and the liquor barely touched him. His hand had ached and he was sure something in it was broken, throbbing angrily under chain and leather whenever he moved... but he did not feel it. He looked upon death and struggle and he felt...

Hungry. Hungry and home. 

Now he was before this lovely girl, gentle and kind even after all she had endured, all she had _become_ , and still so. But he was still himself. He'd proved that on the field.

She giggled nervously and a familiar flush came to her cheeks. "What's funny?"

"That look," she said, like it was obvious, and he was somehow capable of studying his own eyes. "I see it in you sometimes. I still cannot place it."

They were in a hallway and anyone could walk past... but still, he stepped closer. He looked down far at her and he remembered when doing so had brought fearful tears to her eyes. Now she inhaled sharply and... yes, her mouth parted. Just a fractio. Damn him but how did that simple movement of her lips arouse him more than any painted whore than he'd ever been with?

_Because she is not one, fool. And yet she wants you._

"What would you guess?"

"I... I'm not sure," she said, wetting dry lips and drawing a twitch from his breeches. "It looks... looks almost like..."

Another step. Close enough for his hand to slide to her hip and caress her gently, hands moving in slow circles at her side, eyes wide and fierce, pinning her to her place. 

"Like...?"

Now it was her turn to stumble over her words. She cleared her throat and looked away briefly and still, the words did not come. He leaned down, seeking some sweeter respite than he'd gained from his sword, and gripped her hip tighter-

"Fuck!"

-only to have his hand erupt in flames from bone to hairs and he jerked it away and-

"Sandor?!"

"It's... damnit, it's nothing."

"What happened? Are you injured?"

_Such concern. Worry making her ugly and beautiful. All for you._

"Frey bastard hit me with his sword," he said bluntly, as if nearly having his hand lopped off were a nuisance. "Just hurts is aAAAAH, girl, what are you-"

Sansa Stark had grown bold, that was for true. She grabbed his wrist with a speed he had not expected, then ran her fingers over his own. His whole body twitched in pain at the simple contact, when they roamed over his middle finger and a spike of pain shot through him. She saw his face and the grimace he wore. Gods, that would hardly make him look better to her, with his jaw tight and stretching the scrap of skin covering half-

"Come inside. I'll dress it."

"What?! Girl, it's just-"

"It could be _broken_ , Sandor! Someone _hit it with a sword!_ "

"I've survived worse-"

No-no-no, her head was shaking and to all the hells, why could he not deny her when she was like this? His only avenues were anger and silence and he could give her neither now, not when she opened her door and took him by the elbow and a girl mayhap half his size - mayhap - tried to drag him into her room.

"You're coming in anyway, aren't you?"

Sandor paused at that. His gaze danced around the hallways as if some invisible crowd were judging him. He knew how castles worked, and their retainers. They were ever-seeing, but never seen. Affairs done behind locked doors and in high chambers were nonetheless noted and whispered upon, and who was to say who would learn of them? Strangely, Sandor found himself uncaring. He was her sworn shield. His place was by her side, and-

"Are you coming or not?"

His mouth scrunched into a reluctant grimace and he closed the door behind them. "At least tell me your healing touch has improved since that fucking _swamp_."

"I did a _fine_ job, thank you," she said, quite the proper lady as she went to her basin and soaked a rag in water. "The healer lady said so."

"Huh. Same one that put a fucking knife to my throat?"

She whirled and streamed red sunlight behind her, candles in the room casting low light and for just a moment, Sandor felt like a boy again, gazing at maiden. 

"She what?!"

"I _may_ have given her cause."

"Sandor...?"

"I woke... _somewhat_  angered-"

"Sandor-"

"And I _may_ have grabbed her."

"Oh, enough..."

He chuckled as he sat on the end of her bed, smile reaching all the way to his eyes at her fluster, shaking her head like she would never truly fix... gods, he hadn't meant to think of it that way. What was there to fix, after all? The damage was long done to him. From the moment his face had been charred to an abomination, Sandor Clegane was marked for the vile and the vicious. His smile faded and crumbled to a scowl. But still she sat next to him and took his hand, and tried to soothe his pain.

Sandor watched her in silence and truly, the pain lessened. Losing himself in the sight of her tending to him, slim fingers moving carefully as they took off his gauntlets - fine, so that did hurt a little - and then the gloves under them, washing each finger with such slow tenderness. She'd hurt him once, and didn't want to again. Warm cloth glided over his hand and as she started to wrap the tingling skin, his other raised... and stroked her hair...

Sansa froze and looked at him. He treasured those moments, and he hated himself for that weakness, but... he was still powerless for them. Oh, he was hungry, out there on the field. He was home, amid slaughter. But he felt a twin to that when he was with her, just as Sansa, not Lady Sansa or "m'lady". Years of training and rearing growled that he pushed too far, overstepped his duties... but still his hand moved through her curls, marveling at their softness, how they never seemed to lose that light, flowing feel.

Then he cupped her cheek, and her skin was something far more. Fine and smooth and gods, his words were so simple and peasant-like to describe her. The way she leaned into his touch like it was ambrosia to her, closed her eyes with a sleepy smile, so delicate and vulnerable.

"Thank you."

She finished tying the knot above his hand. It still throbbed but not nearly as bad as before, muffled and numbed by warm, wet cloth. "I don't want you to stay injured. Will you have someone see to it tomorrow? Make sure it is not broken?"

"Aye," he said, leaning close again and with no fears buzzing around his mind of being spied upon. "I will..."

He could have spent days exploring her lips with his own. Every time for him was like the first, unexpected and ripe and awakening him. So lost was he that it took him moments to notice that her tongue did not move as his did, with want and arousal, that her hands were by her side and she pulled away-

Rejection. Harsh and cold and freezing him.

"I... I'm sorry."

Understanding. Resignation. A lifeless mask that settled over his features, walling up his true feelings. 

"I... yes. I'll go-"

"I saw many men die today." Her voice was a low whisper now. She sat gazing at his dressed hand, sitting limply in her own, her thumbs rubbing gently over the knot she'd fashioned. "I have... It was not..." She sniffed and Sandor sighed. Little bird was unused to such rank, massed butchery. She'd survived the riots in King's Landing and the Blackwater and the Vale... but never had she laid eyes on true battle. "How... When you were-"

"Little bird..."

His hand captured her chin and gently tugged her gaze to his. 

"Did it scare you?"

Some word formed on her lips. He could see the shape of it, but then she changed her mind. He frowned. She hid something, but the turmoil leaking from her eyes stalled his suspicions and she finally just shook her head and leaned closer... head against his shoulder... firm little hands grasped around his back. 

"I just want to sleep," she said into his chest, and he felt absurdly jealous that she could put such longing into dreams but not for his touch. Sandor smirked at his own ego and stroked the back of her hair. "Sleep and forget, if I can."

"You won't," he said, honest with her as ever. "But it will become easier."

She held him and he held her and he would not be moved. Even entwined in such a simple way was a balm to him. He didn't feel the weight of his armor, nor his weapons. He was separated from her by layers of metal and leather and cloth, but she still encompassed him with her frail form, and his sigh wasn't the ragged gasp of his past nights. It came smooth and steady and somewhere close to content.

"Was it for you?"

"It's different for me."

"Because you-"

A second time, her words fled. Before he could enquire further she looked up at him and smiled. 

"Time for bed, Sandor. Too much talking already tonight."

"Oh," he said, raised a satirical eyebrow. "Here or at the table?"

Her weariness and nameless worry slid away in a moment, enough to roll her eyes and stand. "Definitely the table, methinks. So much to know and to think of. Men and banners and houses and places and times and rations and horses-"

"And far more besides," he rose as well and walked to the table next to the bed, unfastening his armor piece by piece and laying it on and across a nearby chair. "Did y'think war was just rushing from battle to battle?"

She sighed behind him and his hand paused at his pauldrons as he heard a familiar rustle. Falling cloth. Shimmering sound of it, a waterfall of grey wool to the floor. He gulped and closed his eyes for a moment. Told his body to fucking behave itself, since the girl just wanted to sleep and yes, yes, he would definitely be sleeping above the covers that night. 

"Just the time it takes. The more we take the more Ric-"

Her voice stopped and Sandor turned and already the tears were falling. She was dressed in naught but her shift and the candles behind her threw the shadows of her body stark under it, dark and vague curves under the thin fabric... and yet Sandor did not notice. He looked to her face, and the fear that was wrenching it from tiredness to fresh, sleepless agony. She settled on the bed and he tossed the pauldrons aside, down to his tunic and breeches.

_Not so many nights ago, you were in this place again._

"Sansa... Sansa...?" He crouched before her and whispered, peering through the flowing tide of red hair that was over her face, her hand almost covered as she sobbed into it. "Don't do this to yourself, little bird."

"I can't... I can't help it..." She shook her head and gripped the sides of the mattress... but not him. "He's all alone, Sandor. Alone with that... _thing_ , Ramsay."

"Sansa," he said, voice stern, hard, enough to break through her grief and force her eyes to his. "He's not some whore that the Bastard took for torture and rape. He's a highborn hostage. The heir to Winterfell. Ramsay isn't mad enough to abuse him so. His _father_ needs the boy alive and _unharmed_ , or every house in the North will turn on him."

"But you _don't know?!_ "

Gods, there was so much choking her words that he couldn't ease. Anger. Shame. Pain, beyond just the flesh... and that awful, blank ignorance that was tearing her apart. Sandor leaned forward and cupped her face, pressing his forehead to hers without even thinking of her lips (not much, at least).

"We'll get him back," he said simply, in that same tone he's used when he'd sworn himself to her, low and rasping as his voice was. "We will. But torturing yourself without result won't help you, or him. Please, Sansa..."

That's what it came to. Him pleading for her to... what? Cut her heart from her chest and ignore it? Put her brother out of her mind completely, forget about him? What could Sandor replace it with? His groping fingers when all she wished for was sleep? He sighed and felt stupid, useless... and she sighed back at him, hands reaching up to massage his wrists.

"Let's go to sleep."

"Yes."

She wriggled under the woollen covers and frowned when he remained on top. He caught her look and a rakish smile crossed his face... or at least as much as that face could be suave. "Better for me to stay above, little bird. Never know what might happen..."

He expected... something else. For her to blush and say in that low but insistent voice that she wanted him under the sheets with her, and his body wrapped close around hers, just like it had been in the tent. Gods, and that was only the night before, and both of them had slept deep and true. But she did not. She nodded, and she placed a chaste kiss to his cheek... then turned from him.

Sandor had never been more confused. Had he... done something? He opened his mouth to question but already she was still, moving only with her breath as she laid on her side, tumbling curls covering her head completely. Sandor frowned at the ceiling as he lay on his back, studying the ancient stone blocks and wondering, pondering...

What had he seen in her eyes, and ignored? 

_'Twas almost like fear._

His thoughts ran in circles but his body was having none of that nonsense. It was tired and his elbow still ached like a bastard after that fucking lizard tried to chew it off. The hardship of the day's killing came to visit him now, held back by his duty and stubbornness for hours. He flexed his hands with his lips pressed tight and... gods, mayhap he had broken something. Shite. Maester then, come the morning. He shook his head and closed his eyes, muted his queries. That was all for the morrow. A night surrounded by stone walls, with candles on the dresser and a fire crackling on the wall, that was his night. Yes... and they _both_ deserved that.

He did not know how long it had been. Minutes or hours, he was still shoved and prodded from dreamless slumber. The aether faded to reality like he was coming up for air under deep water, and Sandor knew without thought he was being... struck. Hit. 

His hand flew to his sword before his eyes were open and he sat bolt upright-

-to face an empty room, innocently flickering candles worn down to molten wax. But there was moaning. Sobbing. Pleading-

Coming from his side. He looked down and coinfusion curdled to horror as he saw Sansa thrashing next to him. Her covers were tossed aside, body lathered with sweat under her shift, sweat clinging to her and laying every curve to his eyes. But her face... it was wet with tears. She was begging someone, something, pleading for it to go away and leave her alone, arms thrashing but never banishing the spectre. Instantly Sandor dropped his sword and clutched her shoulders, eyes wide with worry-

"Sansa?! Sansa, it's me?!"

Her eyes flashed open and she sucked in a breath. Then her eyes saw him.

Sandor _knew_ , in that horrible, crystal moment, what her dream had been. _Who_ had tormented her. What she raged against and tried to flee.

Because she took one look at his burned face and she saw him, she knew him, the recognition flaring in her eyes that was waking, not dreaming... and she screamed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow... OK, so that was a lot longer than I intended. Sorry if it becomes a slog! I really wanted to cover those three POVs and scenes in this chapter before moving on. Lemme know if it's too much.
> 
> The last half of this came veeeeeeeeery slowly... then real quick, hehe! Not sure if that's good or bad. Meh, as always, YOU be the judge. ;-)


	21. Chapter 21

**SANSA**

_She hoped for the pack. To return to that wilderness where she was more than wolf but less than woman and she was with her family and safe. The searing yellow eyes of the giant wolf-mother still haunted her at times, a nagging pull that trembled through her bones or apart from the flesh entirely. But she did not find that forest that night._

_Sansa found the field, and she was no longer just watching. She was nose to shoulder with the carnage._

_That seemed the word for it: always conjuring images in her mind of sickening, churning motion married to rage and hate and blood. Now she had livid, real memories to bring to her musings, and... and there was no control to stop her mind. Sansa was amidst the frozen field and the blood fell in rain and it soaked the ground until she was wading through it up to sticky ankles and every man that died clutched at her and begged or screamed or laughed or vomited his guts around her._

_Horses tottered around with their guts hanging in stinking ropes from their slit bellies. Boys, not men, still smooth-chinned with plumpness to their faces, battered each other with rocks and broken swords, slammed the heads of men they barely knew into the ground or held them under the puddles of choking, coppery scarlet. Sansa staggered and screamed but her feet were lead and her voice would not come; it was a small and fragile thing, a squeak in the hurricane of violence around her._

_She could taste the rain and wanted to vomit. She tried to find the sun but all the sky was red and glowing. No matter how hard she ran, the battle had no edges; she closed her eyes and the screams grew louder and she fell, over and over, until her grey dress and cloak were sodden through and she could feel that cloying liquid horror soaking into her skin._

_Laughter boomed from the middle of the field, like a horn calling all to order. Sansa turned and saw a monster in armor blacker than night, than ocean depths, laying about himself with a wailing sword, long as a man was tall. Men burst to flames or to offal as the blade touched them, screaming steam flying from them and feeding the dripping, dribbling maw. As she took him in, every awful inch, he turned to her... and she saw his face was ripped clean in two. One half harshly handsome in a way utterly masculine, but the other a red, raw, bleeding, smoking mess of charred flesh and burning muscle. Eyes hungry and horrible found her and a forked tongue licked bloody lips._

_He stomped over to her and Sansa couldn't move. She screamed until her throat was sore and throbbing but no sound came out. The giant loomed so far over her he almost bent over her, broad and tall enough to hide every scrap of the sky, and all she could see was black plate shiny with blood and entrails and a hand the size of her head reached around her throat and jerked her gaze up and she saw her terror in those eyes-_

_"Silly little bird," the voice was all voices. It was Joffrey's smug, smirking, sadism. Gregor's animal bellows, choked with hatred for all living things. Petyr's icy politeness that smiled even as it violated everything decent. It was the breathless rasp of the men who would rape her and it was Cersei's bitter jealousy and-_

_Sandor. As she'd first met him, but forever frozen there, without hope for change or redemption. Just a hulking mass of hate and rage. "I told you. I told you what the sweetest thing was. And you..."_

_A tongue impossibly long and scaled and bifurcated oozed from his lips and stroked up her face, and Sansa sobbed and screamed and flailed but it still scraped the skin from her soft cheeks. The monster rasped out a chuckle, like he was gargling bile and blood._

_"You are nothing, and you never were. You know that is true."_

_The giant smirked and his cheeks split along bloody seams. Teeth like rusted knives glistened dully at her._

_"You've seen me now. Seen what I really love..."_

_"No," she managed to choke out, even as the vomit clung to the back of her throat, "No... that's not... true!"_

_"You saw it!"_

_The voice roared and her eardrums ached and trembled, force of it driving her down to her knees-_

_-or would have, if a hand like taloned steel wrapped in skinned flesh didn't jerk between her legs and hold her up, and Sansa felt the bile bubble in her throat again, tried to scream and beg-_

_"Please... please, no... Sandor, you... you aren't... please-"_

_"Yes, I am, little bitch," the voice said, and it was just him, as horrible as she first remembered and in that rasp he gave just to her, now twisted as she felt keen claws push and slice through her dress, closer to her womanhood. "You lied to yourself. Stupid, stupid little Sansa..." He smiled and it was brilliant and white and Joffrey's. But the face was always Sandor. "Now... to finish what they started... in King's Landing..."_

_Sansa's control snapped and it would never mend. She thrashed and hit out and punched and her arms ached and her knuckles cracked but they never, never even gave the giant pause. He shredded the bottom of her dress and she felt hideous claws caress her and Sansa wept and screamed and opened her eyes wide-_

_"Sansa... Sansa..."_

_There was nothing but him. No room. No field. No forest. Nothing but the nightmare with the ruined face, looking down at her... and he wouldn't go away! Even as the fuzzy outlines of dream vanished and Sansa was sure she was back, he'd followed her from the horror and was there and she screamed-_

"Sansa, steady n-"

"GET AWAY FROM ME!"

She pushed hard at him but he was sheer muscle against her barely-awake hands. She only pushed herself backwards, away from him... and that's when the monster's mask cracked in half. Her shriek of disgust and loathing, it pierced the beast deeper than any blade could have. Sansa blinked... over and over... and within moments the distorted, mutated, monstrous mashing of all her fears was... Sandor. Sandor, who had rescued her from Baelish, saved her from a life as his toy, then as lizard food in the swamp. Who had watched over her and held her and-

Now he was looking at her and Sansa could see anguished understanding in his grey eyes. She panted and gasped air back into her lungs. She... she was not violated. Her clothes were whole and her skin unblemished. She was in that safe room and it had all been a nightmare, but...

"S... Sandor?"

He didn't answer her. The agony in his eyes had vanished, crushed by something stony and unfeeling. Panic was on her again. Gods... what had she done?! 

"I... I had a nightmare-"

"About me." He said in a cold, dead voice, not asking questions but stating facts he knew she would not even try to hide. He ground out the words as if each of them pained, but he fucking did it anyway. Sansa shook her head and heaped lie on guilt and did not care. "That's why you screamed at me. Because I was hurting you. Because you _dreamed of me hurting you_."

"Sandor, I-"

"Clegane?!" Pounding at the door and a voice too young for the bass he tried to put in his shout. "What's going on?! I heard-"

"Lady had a night terror, boy," he said, shuffling off the bed before she could reach out for him. "She's better now."

There were anxious boots scraping behind the door. Sansa could see a thin shadow dancing on the knife-edge of light beneath it, and then Niall's normal voice came pattering through instead. "Er... anything I can do, then?"

"Stand your post," Sandor said, and then to her horror, grabbed his mail shirt. "I'll be with you soon."

Her heart jumped to her throat and she had to swallow it down, wasting precious seconds. The chainmail sounded like a rain of distant, tiny anvils as he raised it over his head. 

"Sandor... wait, I have to talk to you." 

He said nothing. Didn't even look at her. Just stared mutely down at his boots and weapons and straightened the chain-link garment that stretched down to his waist and Sansa could could have used as a dress. Sansa knee-walked over to the edge of the bed and without even looking, he slid further from her. She felt the tears start to come now. Gods, she had been so stupid, but... but she couldn't have helped it. She-

"It was the battle," she blurted out, desperation soaking her voice, anything to get his attention. "Seeing you... you enjoying it so much."

Sandor paused for a moment as he buckled his belt on, bastard on his left, dirk on his right. Hope swelled in her and she reached out...

His fingers resumed their methodical progress. His face was as blank as his eyes, staring into nothing, focused but on the minute tasks at hand. Not even registering her as in the room. Sansa's breath began to choke her, rising panic dragging her to her feet, standing at the end of the bed.

"Sandor, _please_." She had to do _something_ , and a _normal_ something wouldn't do it, so she stepped in his path instead. "I'm sorry. I... I didn't mean it. It was just... just a stupid dream, please, please believe me..." She raised her hand and his grey eyes shone for a moment, wanting so much to believe her-

Then his own snapped up and strong, rough fingers wrapped around her wrist. The light died as he looked at her. Sansa let out a sob as he became that dog again, without... no... worse than that. Once thing to have nothing to live for, resigned to a bloody death without anyone to weep for you. But now she saw a man with sadness in him, a betrayal that he did understand... because he'd had something and she'd taken it from him.

 _He thinks I lied to him_ , she thought, words icy cold and incapable of coming to her lips as she shook her head. _That it was **all** a lie._

"Sandor, let me-" 

As gently as one so large could, Sandor put his hand on her hip... and pushed her inch by inch out of his path, inexorable and emotionless, looking over her shoulder instead of in her eyes. Sansa pawed at his arm as he swept by her, a breath of wind against the cold tornado in chainmail he now seemed. He opened the door and her hands clasped together as if in prayer to the Seven, but they trapped her nose and mouth so her twisted, crying face could not be seen.

"Sandor," she rasped, knowing Niall would be out there, hating that she could not just shout at him, or better- "I... I _order you_ to stay."

Later she would worry about hating herself for that. She had sworn to herself that she would not a use the vow he had so freely pledged, and tonight... merely to have him stay in her room? Yes. She would hate herself, but that night, in the wake of what she had done, she did not care. 

He didn't turn to her. Didn't speak. But she could see the side of his face, the unburned side, the one most capable of emotion. His cheeks looked hollow and his jaw couldn't be moved without a pry bar. His eyes were hooded and empty and... sad. Mourning. Grieving. But like blank earth being shoveled over a fresh corpse, they shifted to the stark, deathly calm she'd often seen in him. Sansa hadn't understood it before, but now she did.

_Better not to feel at all, than feel what he does now._

He walked away and he closed the door behind him, leaving Sansa to slump back onto her bed and dissolve into angry weeping under the dying candles.

 

**NIALL**

The not-squire tasted blood and mud in his mouth for the fifth time (or was it the sixth?) and had to bite down hard not to lose his temper. His trainer was usually slow and patient in his training. Which wasn't to say he didn't held back and treated Niall like a child; he treated him like a grown man, just _not_ one that had experience wielding a sword. They drilled through things he called "forms", which were groups of strokes that could do... well, pretty much anything, as far as Niall could see. They could parry a strike or counter it; swipe a man's leg off at the knee or lay open his chest; occupy his sword so your feet would slide around him, almost like a dancer, leaving them open to a fresh attack or a second weapon.

That was what kept popping into Niall's mind when he trained with Clegane: that the man had more grace than anyone his size or grisly appearance should be. Niall was a head shorter and far lighter, but the big man stepped and slid and glided around him with smooth-

"Precision," the big man had rumbled at him, the first day they'd started training. "That's what makes a swordsman, boy. Not how hard you can swing, not even how fast. But putting your blade _where_ you want it, and making sure when your enemy does the same, you're just not _there_. How d'ya think that happens?"

"Um... experience?"

"That's part of it, but the rest..." The hulking definitely-not-knight had tossed him a wooden training sword over to the boy as if it weighed nothing... which Niall quickly found out was not the case. "Is all the training."

Niall struggled to hold the thing level with one hand and used both instead. "Gods... is the real one this heavy?"

"No," Sandor said matter-of-factly, swishing his own through the air with one hand, letting the hilt fly and flip over the top of his knuckles with mindless, practiced ease before catching it again. "Bout half the weight, actually. Know why?"

Niall frowned and thought for a moment. Well, if it was heavier in training... it would be harder... you'd be slower... but when you used the real thing-

"So... you'll be faster with a real sword?" Sandor's gaze didn't soften a fraction, but there was no growling to cut him off so he continued with a gulp. "Because you're used to swinging around a heavier one. Lighter sword, moves faster... right?"

Sandor's mouth had twisted on one side into something like a smile. "Hope for you yet, boy."

Parry. Thrust. Riposte. Cut. Counter. Lunge. Niall had been bombarded with highborn words just as he'd been bombarded with blows from a man with arms like an ox, but it had been worth it, and his teacher had been hard but fair with him. 

No longer.

"Get up, boy..."

The voice held no hope, no warmth. Niall bit his lip and grunted as tired, bruised arms complained and groaned under him... but he complied. He turned and faced Sandor again across the mud now turgid from their stamping, sliding feet. The big man was in mail still, not his full suit of plate. His longsword rested in its scabbard on a chair, along with his bastard, his dagger. It was the second training sword he held now, leveled at the younger man with his eyes keen.

"What did you do wrong?"

_Thought that you'd have calmed the hells down by the morning?_

Yes, and wouldn't that convince his trainer not to put him on his arse yet again? 

Niall ran the fight back in his mind, or at least the last few moves. Sandor circled him as he though, and Niall slipped into the same movement, legs crossing each other... but no higher than his knees, less he lose his balance... sword perpendicular, or "on guard" as Sandor called it, ready to defend or attack.

"I swung to hard," he said eventually, working his tongue around his mouth and finding a stinging, bloody tear where a tooth used to be. "Left me open to your fist."

"Not just your sword you can use, boy. Your fists, your legs, your head, your knees, all of it-"

Sandor lunged hard, swinging down at Niall and he knew he couldn't block that mammoth blow so he-

-stepped to his side and let Sandor slash at the empty air he'd stood in, then swung his own sword sideways, aiming for Sandor's side-

-only for the big man to jerk his own weapon back up, wooden blades cracking hard into each other like trees colliding as they fell in the woods. Niall's wrists ached and his finger bones rattled around in his hand as he clenched his teeth and gripped, pushing back until his arms burned against Sandor, their wooden words grinding against each other between them, feet braced.

"This is called a _bind_ , boy. Now," Sandor said, sound more amused than winded. "What do you do now?"

Niall searched but... it was a stalemate. If one let go, he left himself open. They were like two wolves with their jaws on each others' throats. He opened his mouth to say just that and-

"This, boy."

-Sandor stepped to his side with that same uncanny speed, pulling his sword away from their clench and in a blink the "against" that Niall had been "pushing" was gone, just air and mud in front of him and-

-he lurched forward, utterly off-balance.

He was undone. That was what broke his cool. He would have kept tottering and stumbling until he went facedown again and _that_ would have been _enough_ to teach him. But he heard wood whistling through the air as he went past Sandor, and as his body finally bent over to fall-

He cried out as Sandor's sword slapped across his back, knocking him down hard and half his ribs were livid and shaking and Niall gasped into the cold, welcome mud.

"Get up, boy," Sandor said, and Niall felt his free hand curl into a wet, filthy, furious fist. "We're not done."

He looked up and saw the other training session taking place in little courtyard behind the main keep of the castle, just beyond the stables. Lady Cerwyn and her trio of guards were swinging blunt swords and the lady herself her double-headed ax. Her breeches and leather shirt certainly were not a highborn maiden's idea of a flattery ensemble, but they allowed her far greater movement, and Niall had to admit, it was oddly compelling, seeing the big woman and her meaty arms and thick thighs move with such confidence and purpose. He could see her guards weren't holding back or going easy: their lady had told them she wanted to train, to become a warrior worthy of battle, and they fought her with strength, treating her like a true lady and not a fragile girl.

She returned it, with every stroke. But they stopped for a moment as they saw Niall go flying, battered down to the mud even when he was beaten. Outrage clouded their features for a moment, the sheer unnecessary cruelty of Sandor's treatment obvious. Niall heard his iron boots squelch and such around his prone body, and he was looking their way... and then he turned his back, looking down at him with a sneer.

"Fuck's your problem, boy? On your feet."

"Maybe," Niall said, suddenly and insanely uncaring for Sandor fucking Clegane and his moods and his harshness just for the sake of it. Only kick a dog so many times before it bites back, he thought, even if he did mentally gulp after wards. " _You're_ the one with the problem, _ser_."

The rest Sandor could have just growled at; the last was not the case. Fast as a falling mountain he jerked a hand down and pulled Niall to his feet with contemptuous ease, shoving him backward away from him. Niall threw up his defence, gritting and bearing his teeth as his elbow throbbed under his filthy shirt.  

"Mind your tongue, boy, or what I'll do will seem like a lady's embrace next to what I already have." 

" _You_ said never to fight angry," Niall said back quickly, sticking with using Sandor's own words against him. "But now you _are_. What happened last night with Lady Stark?"

At the mention of her name, Sandor's eyes went from sullen to scorching and Niall's quiet, half-formed suspicions burst into screaming validation at the sight of it. He knew it. He knew what he'd heard in their tent the nights before; he knew that she'd whispered to him the other the last night, when she'd had her "night terror" and he'd opened the door. He couldn't make out her words, but the tone... 

Niall may have been young, but he was far from a fool. He could read people, in fact he relied on that ability. Knowing if someone was happy or sad or frustrated or eager, they could be all the arms he could wield. He'd heard the grief and pain in her voice, the _pleading_ , broken and desperate. He was glad Sandor hadn't wanted to talk and just squeezed his bulk onto a bench in the hall, opening him lips only to tell him that Niall would take first watch, and wake him in four hours. 

The not-squire had stood there and his thoughts had muttered and gossipped and fought amongst themselves, but Niall did not move. Could not. He wasn't a knight like-

_Well, he **isn't** a fucking knight, and whatever happened last night, he doesn't need to take it out on **me**._

The smirk was too far. He knew that was what did it. His anger and indignation would have been one thing but later, as he'd pressed the ice to his face and closed his eyes and replayed his memories, Niall knew what broke Sandor's control was the poisonous sneer of knowing, the smug, silent implication of control over Clegane. He spat onto the mud and wiped a chunk of the freezing filth from his face before his lips tugged and he spoke.  

"Can't you just kiss and make up, eh?"

Sandor stopped moving. Just for a moment. Niall felt a chill pimple his flesh from his spine to his neck, all the way up his back, and he raised his sword-

It didn't matter. Even when taking out his frustrations, Sandor had held back. No longer. He came in fast and from the side, Niall barely managing to block the blow, whacking into his own sword hard enough to send every bone in his arm trembling. They hadn't even faded before Sandor was at him again, the other side, face twisted in fury and his scars suddenly far more terrible-

-Niall jerked down fast and blocked again-

-then cried out as Sandor's free hand hammered into his side, battering a kidney and fuck he'd be pissing blood tomorrow-

-he gasped and staggered and tried to raise his sword-

Sandor's hand snapped out with a grunt and he held his arm upright, making him feel like a helpless child. He glared, hot and hateful, and Niall felt fear squirm in him as he tried to gasp air into lungs that burned with every breath. Sandor raised his own weapon... let Niall see it... then slammed down-

Niall cried out again as Sandor took his legs from under him, but the bastard wouldn't let him fall. Even with his legs useless, Sandor was still strong enough to hold him upright, and as he looked up-

-the big man with the big forehead jerked it hard towards him and with a sickening, hollow crack of bone-on-bone, Niall's word shattered into black, whirling fragments and Sandor finally let him be.

Shouting. Anger. Muffled voices that were thick with accusations... and _his_ , that bastard's, who'd nearly cracked his bloody head open, growling at them without a dram of guilt in his tone. He could barely see. Just flashing images of mud and grey clouds and feet, and every one of them hurt. Finally Niall just screwed his eyes shut and-

_No. NO! You will not crawl in the cold mud just because that... **wanker** knocks you down! Get up. Fucking show him! _

Niall tried, he really did. He managed to get one arm solid under him, then the other, but when he moved... whoooa... was the ground meant to be moving like that? Blood was pounding in his skull, his ears, dripping from his nose and when it cleared he could hear another voice.

Higher. Younger. Concerned and familiar and only when he recognized it did Niall feel safe enough to stop abusing himself. He knelt in the mud with his precious wooden sword from his grip, not trying to get up. Gentle, firm hands gripped under his chin and he looked up into The Maiden, he was sure of it. Red light was pouring from her head and spilling down her face, beautiful and bright. Her pale features were nipped and red from the cold, but her concern was like warmth.

Sansa. Lady Sansa. Niall managed a shaky smile and gulped, swallowing... yep, that was a bloody molar.

"Had day... training... Lady Stark..."

"Boy'll be on his feet in a quarter-hour," Sandor said, sounding more bored than worried, arms crossed across his door-wide chest. "Let him be and-"

"Hold your tongue, Clegane!"

Niall's eyes widened and he ignored the lightning flashes of pain behind his eyes. He'd never heard her speak to the big, black-metal-clad bugger like that. Clegane's eyes mirrored his own and his lips curled inwards with anger, but when she met his gaze, fire fit to burn down his insolence if he pressed matched him... he looked at his feet, and gods, Niall could have kissed the girl in that moment.

"We're going to the maester," she said, helping him to his feet with an arm around his waist. Gods... really, could she _not_ feel the ground moving? Bloody odd that she couldn't. "You could have broken his skull, Sandor."

"Boy overstepped," Sandor shot back, voice deadly calm, each word shot like an arrow. "He needed to learn."

Niall felt fear hunch his shoulders at the unsaid threat. Mayhap Sansa felt it in him because she turned back to Sandor then and he could not see her face... but he could see Sandor's and the shame that shone in his eyes for just a moment, before he bowed his head and a veil of black hair obscured his face. Her words were sharp and there was something lingering under them he could not name; resolved and certain of what they said even as they despaired of him.

"You are _better than this_ , Sandor. Stay in the yard. We will have words when I return."

"He'll not run off, Lady Stark," Jonelle said with feeling, earning a quick glare from Sandor and she took it with nothing but a raised eyebrow. Her men were at her back flanks with true swords drawn, and to Niall they had the look of men who would happily butcher anyone for their liegewoman, besieging foe or present guest. "We will ensure it."

Slowly, carefully, with a concern that made Niall feel both heavy and light at once, the lady and the carter limped back to the castle and to the maester's solar.  

 

**THE WOLF PRINCE**

He _stalked_ through the high stone corridors and past thick oak gates because he honestly didn't know how _else_ they bloody well expected him to walk. Boots that he'd made himself slapped out a relentless, army-on-the-march rhythm as he and the shaggy pair of men to his back moved swiftly through Winterfell. Blue eyes once bright with curiosity as a boy were now keen with suspicion, casting this way and that at tapestries and frescoes and heirlooms on the walls, proud banners from his house and others.

He knew that the men and lords and legends emblazoned on manner were blood to him, distant kin in some cases, others only a lifetime or so removed.

He was a Stark of Winterfell. He had a sister who wore a crown and two brothers in the far north and another long dead, along with a second sister and his parents. He remembered only one of them; the brother who spoke in in the groaning trees. Others told him who he was, what he'd done, like he was stupid child who had forgotten the simplest of facts.

They told him his name was Rickon, but all he could remember was his lame brother's lips forming that word, and the fierce-eyed woman, and the giant, and Shaggy. Shaggy was always there. 

Such as that moment, in fact. While he and his Skagosi pounded their feet on the ageless stone, the creature nearly the size of them all combined moved with the barest of sound. Only the slight hiss from his back leg dragging a little gave him away, and the restless, pained breathing, like that of an older man compared to a younger. Fur black as a moonless night covered him from snout to tail, marred only by where scars and conflict had torn so deep the fur grew only in clumps. One eye was as brilliant and piercing green as when the beast was birthed; the other was milky and nearly sightless. Rickon would know: he'd stared through those eyes often enough. 

At the thought the one they called the Wolf Prince reached out an absent hand and scratched a thumb behind one torn and serrated ear. Shaggy growled as a reflex but a moment later, it was a happy, tongue-lolling pant instead, even if it did display canines worthy of a young dragon. 

 _You fought so hard for me_ , Rickon thought, words and memory conjuring that familiar swell of hot, poisonous anger. 

A pair of maids, arms loaded with empty dishes, gasped audibly as the trio (well, quartet, if you counted the direwolf, which Rickon always did) marched past as if they were spurred to a mortal duel. Rickon's permanent frown didn't move when they looked meekly at their feet when he passed, but it did deepen a touch as whispers twittered from their lips when they thought he couldn't hear. One ear twitched and he tilted his head slightly, an old reflex to hear and know _all_ of his surroundings.

 _Handsome_. That was one word he heard, but he could hear the refined southron lilt of Highgarden in the other maid's, and...

_A bit of rough? The hells is that meant to mean?_

Rickon growled so low and harsh in his throat it almost sounded like he was about to spit. Shaggy perked up for a moment, sensing some danger, but it had subsided. His master, brother and friend was just in one of his odd moods. The boy grown to a hard man tosses his head as if trying to bite his own ear, something he picked up from Shaggy, burned brown hair flying around his ears and shoulders for a moment. 

Behind him, Carcer and Dunn exchanged stoic, knowing looks. Their chief was struggling with something. Both knew what had birthed it; both knew the subject; neither had a fucking clue as how to aid him. 

Rickon banished thoughts of women (or mayhap one in particular) from his mind as they neared the great, grand double doors with Stark men-at-arms outside it. Music from the south wafted through the air, muted by the door but then shrieking out at them as the guards opened it up. Rickon noted the looked on the men's faces, staring without shame or fear of questioning. Not because he was (as he'd been told) an heir to this castle, nor was (apparently) royal blood and that meant he could do as he willed; but because he was Rickon of Skagos and if he _wanted_ to look at something, he damn well _did_.

But that same attitude was both mirrored and reversed in their eyes. He could see their trepidation around him, the way their mailed fingers gripped their spears a touch tighter. Then he saw the respect, mayhap grudging, but definitely there. He'd been told that his deeds over the years had been told and retold and thus grown far larger than truth. His name among the smallfolk was almost as loud as the one he bore, the name of the father and mother he did not remember.

The Wolf Prince. Or the Wild Prince, though he'd heard that was less popular, since it was only a handful of letters from "wildling".

He didn't care. The wildlings were often a nuisance, especially near the Northern Ruins, but they were a fierce and hardy people, and once you had their respect, you never lost it. Rickon appreciated them... almost more than the woman in a grey wool dress at the head of the banquet table taking up most of the room, giant Stark banner hanging behind her from floor to ceiling. When he entered and she saw the sharp angles of his face, the battered old wolf next to him, the Queen in The North rose and bowed her greeting. A score of chairs scraped and scratched the floor and the squealing made Rickon frown harder. Men he did not know toasted his entry and Rickon ignored them all.

He looked only to his sister and strode towards her, eyes softening just a fraction as she drank in her kind smile, the soft tilt of her head... the sadness still wet and new behind her blue eyes. Just like his own. That was how Rickon had known, all those years before, that her slow words to him were not a lie, some trap he did not understand. He'd snapped and glowered at her like a wolf in a trap, but then she'd spoken and she had the same blue eyes he saw in his dreams, when he was not riding in Shaggy's mind.

Rickon did not remember Sansa from the far past of his boyhood... but he knew her when she had rescued him, then he'd done the same for her, and in all the years after. He knew that the polite tone of her letter hinted at more than a "desire to speak with my most trusted commander regarding the wildling pacification". Mayhap she truly was his sister, for he felt the invisible, intangible, unknowable pangs pulling him from the wild, black forests of the north back to the civilization he felt as shackles on his arms.  

Because they were family.

 

**QUEEN SANSA**

She had learned much about ruling over ten years, and one of them was that full men were easier to deal with. Most of the time. She knew that her father had held court in the Great Hall but always waited until after guests and visitors had been seen to before eating. She supposed their hunger made them make bad decisions, or mayhap her father wanted the vague idea of the food to be a _reward_ , for him and for them, to put affairs of their house and folk ahead of their growling stomachs.

Sansa, on the other hand, simply knew that a man with a filled belly was a man _sated_ , and that made him less likely to be a greedy, grasping bastard. That and talking to a man over a hot plate and a cold cup was more agreeable all around. 

That day it was a delegation from the Vale, eager to strengthen and define their trade agreement. Timber for coal and ore, if Sansa remembered correctly. There were a dozen of them, sallow-faced men used to higher altitude, but they'd been polite and peaceable enough. She could tell from their tone that they were unused to "speaking hard words" with a woman, and one not yet seven-and-twenty. Sansa had smiled at that idea, but it had not thawed her eyes.

_Ten years. Ten years as a queen, when I did not wish it, and still, **still** they see what I lack between my legs rather than what fills my mind and heart. _

The harsh truth coupled to crude image had her mind swing in one way only. The Queen cleared her throat and supped down another swig of wine, trying to banish those sharp grey eyes like shards of fire flint. Mere days had passed and reality had sunk on her... but grief and loss were not so easily abated. They hid, like krakens under the veneer of her heart. Any thought could stir them, and when they did...

The door opened and Sansa looked up and smiled, at the sight of her guests and the barely-hidden gasps from the Vale party. 

_Well met, little brother._

_Though not so little_ , she hastily added, with a quick flush of silly familial pride. Her little brother with his chubby cheeks and gap-toothed smile had sprouted and swelled then been chiseled into form by a hard life. He walked with the long, restless stride of a warrior, gaze... gods, so much like Sandor's. Even when the boy was at peace, his eyes were always shadowed by his brows, as if those steaming Tully pools were secrets to be guarded. Twin axes, curved at the bottom like ironborn weapons, hung and clanked gently at his hips, and gods alone knew what other instruments of death and steel he had secreted. Long, dark hair flowed as straight as hers curled; Rickon was forever shaking and jerking it from his eyes, but she'd had to push and finagle for days before he last cut it. His face was sprinkled and studded with dark stubble but a beard was a hard thing for him to grow, and in truth, he had grown so used to the cold he did not need a natural swaddle. 

 _A comely face_ , she'd heard some of her ladies say, _but not a knight from the stories_. Sansa had been oddly proud of that, and she understood it. Rickon had her full lips and shimmering eyes and mayhap the ovals in his face would have convinced a lady he was still a boy... but a few moments more study would have dashed those expectations. Shimmering blue could turn to sharpened ice in a blink; his mouth was ever pressed in a hard line and strong, tanned hands caressed the heads of those strange, black-flecked axes when his wroth waxed and grew. He was the wildest of their pack, as she had ever known, and his eyes had seen far more through Shaggy's than any of them had dared through their own familiars. 

Sansa hid her own smile. Yes, she understood the attraction. A comely face and courtly manners could make a lady _blush_... but the raw, straining heat that Rickon threw out in careless waves... that would make her _wanton_. Her smile grew almost chiding at the thought and then-

She heard him speak. Not in Common. And she remembered just how far from that bouncy boy Rickon had come, and in her mind, strayed.

Sansa would never forget her debt to Osha's soul, for protecting her brother in the harsh wild when he was barely bigger than an infant. But she would never forgive her, either, as stupid and insane as that seemed.  

Skagosi was a harsh language, as befitted its speakers. Rickon had told her that the word itself meant "those of stone" in the Old Tongue, spoken by the First Men that trekked hard over the ice bridge thousands of years before. Each short word seemed to grate and chop, verbal fells of an ax that commanded audience and obedience. The two warriors that never left her brother stopped as he spat a stream of it at them, as if he had never lived at Winterfell, never sat through the boring lessons of Luwin, or splashed in the mud and the snow and laughed as he rode on Shaggy's back like the fearsome wolf was a pony.

Sansa swallowed hard. It was an old pain. She had plenty of them, but how deep it gouged to look at a fine, strong young man, and know he would always be a stranger.

"Your Grace," he said as he stood before the table, bowing low after speaking in his baritone voice. "I have come, as you requested."

"Rickon," she said, a note of chiding in her voice, "You need not call me that. 'Sister' would be more than enough." 

"You are queen also," he said back immediately, and Sansa felt another pang. "Before anything else, you are she I swore-"

"Yes, yes, I understand," she said, sitting back down and gesturing to servants to clear a space for him. Gods, the last thing she wanted to hear was _another_ hard-faced man to wax on about what he'd fucking _swore_ to her. "I'll... not mention it again."

Rickon sat and he let them load his plate but his eyes did not leave her. Blue eyes so harsh and unforgiving danced around uncertainly and one hand vanished... yes, he would be stroking an ax-head now. Sansa resisted the urge to shake her head. Why did she bother? He was no longer her brother, aside from the fact they shared the same mother. Those memories had been scrubbed from his mind like a stain from a pot, and more and more Sansa felt like she was staining him, trying to replace others he had with those that would be useless to him. Better to-

"I was concerned for you too... Sansa," he said, words coming out unsure, as if the tone were a foreign language. Sansa's eyes flew to his and he did not look away, mouth folding inward into a strange, hesitant smile... but one real and without pretense. "Your letter seemed... important. In more than one way."

Sansa looked down and smiled. Wild and wolfish and untamed, but far from stupid. Many dead men had made that mistake of her brother. 

"I am glad you came, Rickon. Affairs in the North are still bloody?"

"True, but not the torrent they have been," Rickon said, not with pride but instead a kind of exhaustion. He rubbed his stubbly face and thanked a serving girl who bit her lip as she left. Sansa narrowed her eyes, just a touch. "The Bone Blades and Giant Bloods were the worst of the raiders, and they are smashed and dead in the snow. The others will come to heel and bend the knee. The rebellion will end with this season."

Sansa nodded and drank in his words. Tedious they may have been, she knew keeping abreast of the rebellion and its downfall were crucial. The wildlings existed largely in peace in the great expanse south of the wall and north of the woods above Winterfell, but "largely" was the important term. There were always those that wanted to keep stoking the endless raiding and feuding and pillaging that had made their people infamous for thousands of years. Even with no need for them to do so. Queen Sansa had understood what had to be done. Warlike men either found a new place in peace, or they turned on themselves, or they made fresh outrages on the peaceful. The first was what she longed for. The second drew her pity, and mayhap her aid.

The third drew only her justice, and thus, her brother's wrath. Such men had no place in her kingdom, and she would not waste bars and cells and guards and food on rapers and murderers. 

"I am glad to hear it, brother..." Then a fresh thought came to her mind, far removed from battle summaries and campaign details. It had a face, too. "And how progress your lessons?"

Rickon's face softened further and this time it bled through from his mind to his eyes and his brow and his mouth. Finally his brow raised up and she could see his eyes unshaded. Gods, they were brilliant, if he'd but let the world see them. They misted over for a moment and the smile that alighted his face was a shy and small thing, so strange on such a hard and hewn face. 

"Fine enough, I think," he said, and his modest words did not match his glowing eyes. Sansa smiled a touch wider. "I have a fine teacher."

"How fares the lady?" She said, and put aside her amusement in favor of true concern. She'd known the girl as long as Rickon had, and found herself always fretting for her. She was alone in the world, and while she was the furthest from a fool Sansa knew, she was still a girl in the North. "When last I heard, even the maesters were considering relaxing their ways to allow her to study with them."

"That had something to do with your influence, I think."

"Just mine?"

Rickon bristled, defensive and taken unawares. Ah, give him his axes and an enemy before him, and he'd slice the bastard to pieces like a walking hog. But show him a girl and he was ignorant as a babe. He fiddled with the side of beef on his plate, as usual eschewing cutlery to use his hands, the long nails he kept on his forefingers to hold and tear with. A savage custom, but when he spoke again, his voice a mumble, Sansa heard only a boy.

"I may have mentioned something to Maester Daynul. She has worked... _does_ work, very hard with the wildlings. Helped them more with her books and words in five years than others have in far longer. Taught them about history and letters and how to farm and such." 

Sansa smiled again. Rickon was no longer talking to her; she just happened to be there as he poured out his words to the plate.

"She would be so happy studying with them, I know that. I know the old rules say women cannot but-" he grimaced and waved a hand over his shoulder "-so many rules are broken and will stay broken forever. These can go do the same and to the hells with them... even if it means she has to go away."

Another flash of Sandor, in her mind. They way he would hide his grief behind gruff. Rickon was the same. He wanted her to stay but he wanted the best for her, and without knowing how or why, he understood that she would be happiest surrounded by all the books and scrolls and strange diagrams that would be so much Dothraki to him. Sansa reached over and touched her brother's hand. His eyes snapped to it and she felt his skin bristle... but he did not pull away.

"It is good that you do such for her. Many others would not, because of..."

She didn't finish, and didn't need to. The soft and tongue-tied boy vanished in a flash of angry blue, limpid pools turned to raging seas. Because of her face. Her scars and scales that weren't her fault, weren't of her asking, and yet still, after ten fucking years, people whispered of the gods' curses. Rickon ripped a hunk of meat open with undue relish and his growl was more like Shaggy's than a Stark's. 

"People are fucking _stupid_."

Sansa managed a lopsided smile. How often had she thought the same, regarding her own half-faced guardian?

 _Guardian no longer_ , she reminded herself. But the pain did not pierce to deep that time. Her brother was back in Winterfell and his black mood passed quickly. He fed Shaggy from the table and she scolded and he grinned. Even Shaggy tried to look innocent, ravaged and battered as the old dog was. Sansa shook her head in defeat... and tossed him a bone hung with scraps of tasty gristle and pink meat. 

"You're teaching _me_ bad habits now, Rickon."

"I wouldn't be your brother if I did not, sister."

The Stark children shared a look, and a smile. Then they got back to their meal, with Shaggy's tail pounding the stones next to his two-leg brother.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hehe, the last part was for you, Jilly. Tolja somethin' was a-comin'... urgh, I've been among southrons for too long... ;-)
> 
> Oh, and [this](http://images2.fanpop.com/images/photos/6300000/Eragon-garrett-hedlund-6398645-853-480.jpg) is the model I have in my head when I write him. Went through a few but this one seemed most fitting... and I don't always man-crush, but when I do, I man-crush Garrett Hedlund. 
> 
> Stay thirsty, my friends.
> 
> And if anyone could tell me the proper HTML tags to actually put a link or an image into the Chapter Notes rather than a big bloody address sitting there all jagged and ugly, I'd really appreciate it!


	22. Chapter 22

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one, in particular, for my favorite Globetrotter. X

**SANDOR**

_One more black look and I'm not going to fucking **care** what Lady Sodding Cerwyn does after. _

Sandor never ceased to be amazed at how blatantly dishonest he could be with himself, even as he devoted himself to spouting nothing but truth to everyone else. Jonelle's three guard dogs were glaring at him without even attempting to hide their disgust and contempt, hands on their hilts, as if the pacing, glowering giant was a broken moment away from flying at their beloved Lady. Jonelle herself was standing with her arms folded across her impressive bosom, face stern and matronly as befit a highborn.

Servants and maids and fighting men scurried around them, most laden with supplies and weapons and armor. Beyond the courtyard, in the far larger one behind the keep, the sound of five hundred men and yet more horses preparing for march sounded like a massive beehive with voices and hooves. But in their little slice of quiet, only Sandor's restless pacing, boots sucking each time he planted them in the mud, could be heard.

_Fuck am I being tied over the barrel for this? Because that fucking boy talked back to his better? **Threatened** me, even? Kid should have kept his mouth shut and learned his lesson. Not **my** fucking fault.  _

There was no contradiction, no competing voice in his mind that morning. Perhaps it was just too damn tired to care. 

Sleep hadn't come to him, at least not easily. He felt like he was treading water in a vast ocean; if he stopped kicking, let himself fall to his dreams, he would drown in them. He didn't want it. None of it. Sandor _hated_ her in those small hours, lying opposite Niall with his face hidden and his eyes screwed shut. Made him weak and he'd let her and for _what_? For her to fear the very sight of him? For him in turn to fear his _own_ dreams?

So he did not sleep; not really. He'd fluttered in and out of weightless, formless limbo and then his eyes snapped open again and he was back... then faded, steadied... floated... gasped-

Until Niall had shaken him awake and he'd taken his post. 

 _Hope he'll be fit to ride,_ he thought, adding that it was _only_ because the boy would be useful when it came to Winterfell and he didn't want to lose him to a silly sparring bump.

_Didn't stop you battering him though, did it?_

Sandor growled and swiped at the air. Fuck. Not _that_ tired, apparently. 

He glared at the three lowborns again and still they were... irritatingly controlled. No sneers nor probing gestures with rude hands; nothing but cold looks of scorn that he couldn't take truly as insult. He'd been getting those since he was seven years old. They came with the territory that was his face. Just one knowing smirk or crack about the boy, or the lady, or himself, that's all he'd need-

_And that would go so well, wouldn't it? Having Lady Cerwyn take your fucking head off for brawling with her own shields. Letting Sansa see just what a destructive, mindless fucking brute you really are._

Sandor bared his teeth like a dog ready to lunge, but still they did not rise to him. They just shuffled a little closer together in front of their lady. Sandor averted his eyes as if... no, fuck _that_ , he wasn't ashamed. He'd enough of that bollocks. He paced back and forth, no outlet for his anger save for the wooden sword that twisted and flipped and spun around his hands, in endless arcs and sweeps. He didn't even need to think about it; his muscles knew the motions better than his mind did. 

_Be patient. Let her come down and scold you, then go back to-_

Fresh feet on the earth, but they crunched instead of squelching. Further away, then, from the mud of their training forum. He turned and saw her walking swiftly to him, careless of the mud staining the hem of her dress, eyes fixed sure and deadly on his hulking form.

Sandor ground his teeth and willed the sullenness to stay in his eyes, but gods it wasn't easy. Furious as she was, she was still beyond beauty to his eyes. She always would be, he supposed, but it wasn't her flawless features that drew the growling anger in his guts that morning. It was what she really thought of him, and gods, he'd been such a fucking fool to think it could ever be otherwise. So let her scold him, lecture him, berate him and spin her pretty, pointless words. He would swallow them with that same silence he'd given her the night before, starve her of words, and go about his duties.

_Yes. Because you can really do that forever, can't you?_

_Shut the fuck up._

"Lady Jonelle," Sansa said as she came back, flashing a smile that spoke of gratitude and a quiet apology. Sandor grunted and turned away, arms folded. _Don't need you doin' my fucking sorrys for me, girl._ "Thank you for keeping an eye on my shield."

"Think nothing of it, Lady Stark," the plump highborn said, taking her battle ax from Castor and hefting it experimentally, getting her muscles used to it weight again. "Would there be anything else?" Sansa cleared her throat and Sandor rolled his eyes. Shite. Of _course_ there was.

"Your godswood is... in the corner of the castle, is it not?"

"Indeed, Lady Stark. Through that far gate, you can't miss the trees."

"Thank you, my lady," Sansa said with a slight curtsy and again Sandor felt hate and wonder war in him, the latter stubbornly refusing to die in his chest. She was heir to the greatest house in the North, and it could easily be thus again when the Starks were restored. House Cerwyn had been a vassal of her father for years, and of her house for centuries... and yet, she still remembered her thanks, no matter what. "Would you mind if...?"

Jonelle scrutinized Sandor with a suspicious eye. He almost felt bad about that. He liked the woman, or close enough to it. She wasn't some soft highborn bitch without any use aside from her cunt; she cared for her people and suffered with them and unless he was very much mistaken, she had _no_ intention of staying behind while Wylis and Kamber and Sansa rode to war. Now she was looking at him like a mad dog without a leash.

"Of course not," she finally said, looking Sandor in the eye one last time. "I'm sure you'll be quite safe with your shield."

Sandor narrowed his eyes and his lips parted but Sansa was already moving to his side, voice somewhere between a growl and a whisper.

"Come with me. _Now_."

No argument. No discussion. No _pausing_ , either, for her tread did not slow. Sandor tossed the wooden sword into the mud and followed her through the gate. The godswood was hardly a challenge to find: in the stone and mud of the castle, a clutch of trees stood out like a giant among dwarfs. Sandor's lady walked straight towards it, odd curl of spun flame peeking from her hood as she went. Unlike the Wolf's Den, the godswood was well-maintained and unspoiled: nothing but trees and grass and mud... and the great, wide white trunk, surrounded by red leaves like a blanket of vast rose petals. 

Sandor's stomach churned and flipped and then was speared by something. He didn't want to think about that morning in the Wolf's Den. The words he spoke to her, and she to him. The way she gripped his face and _needed_ him, like he was air to her, and he'd been so frightened and dared not show it. People didn't want him, and women certainly did not. But she'd... she'd fooled him. She'd given him a ray of hope in the darkness and he'd warmed himself with it and now he saw it was nothing but an illusion.

 _She couldn't love you_ , the voice whispered and Sandor felt like his guts were being punched out. Like he was being led to an execution.

She turned sharply to him and her chin was high. A proper lady. Sandor clenched his jaw and gods, actually cricked his neck to one side, as if he were about to spar once again.

_You **are**._

"Walk away from me now, or interrupt me," she said, and Sandor blinked at how low and dangerous her voice was. It wasn't so much silk hiding steel as it was silk ripped from steel entirely. "And I will not care to follow you. I have much to say to you, and you _will listen_." 

Of course, his first instinct was to walk away, just to prove that he could. But Sandor had been raised to read eyes, smell the lies in them... and she was not japing. If he walked away from her again, Sansa would not chase after him, nor care if he returned or not. He never thought she would come to that extreme, but-

_**You** drove her to it._

_Because of **her** lies!_

"Fine." 

She nodded and turned to the weirwood. She gazed up at that face, unwitting in her recreation of Lady Jonelle's. A whisper from her lips, insubstantial as the breeze that carried it to his ears, and she turned again... letting her hood down and freeing the tresses of her hair. 

Sandor gulped. Gods. She would _never_ stop doing that to him. 

"In the first, I don't care _what_ anger or hate you bear for me, or yourself, you will _not_ indulge it by abusing Niall nor _anyone else_. First those two men in New Castle, and now him? I won't permit that, Sandor. Is that clear?"

"I don't-"

"Is-that- _clear_?"

He ground his teeth and gods, you'd think that after so long knowing her he'd have smashed them down to his gums by now. But he just nodded mutely and wait, that was to be his answer? But it _was_ the truth. He didn't... no, he _couldn't_ hate her. Not what she was nor what she'd become. He shifted his weight from foot to foot and clasped his hands before his crotch, almost as if protection. Little bird certainly had her claws out that morning. She swiped some waving strands from her face and tucked them behind her ear, then turned back to him...

There was a strange and sad light in her eyes. Strong, but... hesitant. Like a woman about to leap into unknown waters. Dark shadows were painted under her eyes and Sandor could see now she had not slept much either. But why would she? She was having nightmares about him, after all. Yes... yes, he wanted to hold onto that anger. It was so much more familiar than... this doubt. The way she had it creep into him and his black foundations. 

"We are going to talk about last night."

Sandor opened his mouth. Sansa raised her finger. Sandor closed it.

"I've been... I _was_ , thinking about it most of the night after you left, then the morning, up until this moment. I have only two questions for you."

Sandor braced himself as if for a blow. He knew what it would be. The answer would be the same as the first he'd given her those years before in that hallway in the Red Keep. It had not changed, no matter how much his soul had churned and his situation had morphed and shifted. At the core of it all, he was still the boy that Tywin had made into The Hound. 

"Those men you kill yesterday..." She took a breath and he saw her hands curl into fists, but those to steady herself, not punch and batter. "... did you enjoy killing them?"

Sandor stared but did not speak. He couldn't run. He wouldn't lie. Why, then, was it taking him so long? Why stretch out the moments and just gaze mutely into her blue eyes as all those around them prepared for war beyond the copse of trees? His mind flew back to the Red Keep, that day when he growled those bloody words to her. It hadn't been so hard; he'd _delighted_ in telling her. So what was the difference?

 _Because then you were trying to scare her_ , the last shred of honesty in him said, and Sandor closed his eyes. He didn't lower them, but that was enough. _Because that was all you knew. Scaring people with the truth and with your face. Then she wormed her way into your heart and still... still..._

_You hope. Even when it's all to ruin and rubble._

_You blind bloody fool._

"Yes," he said when he opened his eyes again. "I enjoyed it."

She took a deep, shuddering breath and tilted her chin up, but the tears he feared did not come. She just nodded, as if she'd been expecting the answer. 

"The sweetest thing there is?"

He could have lied. Every time after when his regret and his grief for what he'd lost gnawed and screamed at him, Sandor would tell himself _that_ moment, that question, as the wind stilled and the leaves trembled above her, that was the moment he could have ended all of it. Strangled their strange and beautiful and horrible journey in its crib. But he could not lie to her.

"I thought that once," he said, rasping edge of his voice softened like a rough board sanded smoother. "No longer. I... love it. I was born to it. It has been my one true talent since I was a boy." Sandor stared at her and tried to will the truth he couldn't speak into her mind. "I thought it was the sweetest. Not anymore."

Ah... now _that_ , she had not been expecting. Her knowing, poised facade crumbled and she looked around, away, down, anywhere but him, like a mummer whose partner had read far from the script. Sandor watched her confusion yet did not allow himself to smile... nor even to hope. Such a thing was poison, she had proven that to him. His mind may have been changed, but still-

"Not that it matters anymore."

"Why?"

"Haven't you had your two questions?"

"I... I didn't-"

"Did I enjoy killing, and is it the sweetest thing?" He said monotonously, always hating having to repeat the words of others. Like he had to serve as ears and mouth for people too fucking doltish to use their own. "Well, I've answered. Is there anything else or can we-"

Sansa stepped forward and the bloody leaves fluttered around her dress. She clasped her hands behind her back and Sandor's voice stalled. She seemed so... sleek, where she did that. The curves and soft angles of her body flattened like a lion's, not a wolf's, and he felt the flush in his good cheek and other parts of him. He looked up, almost suspicious, and found her eyes searching him, one eyebrow cocked-

"Would you enjoy killing _me_ , then?"

Sandor's jaw dropped with a dry _click_. A wrench was thrown in the works of his minds and they ground to a halt then just collapsed. Or they did, until the unconscious image of his hands burying his sword into the girl in front of him flashed unbidden but in perfect detail and he felt bile kiss the back of his throat and shook his head with his teeth clenched.

"N-No-!"

"What about Lady Jonelle?" She plowed on as if she were discussing the weather and Sandor looked her up and down and thought _oh fuck, she's finally gone mad._ "You swore no vow to her. How would you feel about killing her? Would it be sweet?"

"Dream" flashed through his mind as his teeth gnashed together, trying to form words, then she paired "killing" and "sweet" together of her own will and "nightmare" superseded it. He shook his head and she was stealing his sodding wits. He took a step forward, one hand raising gingerly as if to pull her back off a cliff.  

"I-no-Sansa, you're-"

"Niall, maybe?" Gods, her voice was so casual, so polite, but they were... Sandor hated the words. Hated _her_ for speaking them, and the mockery he detected sparking anger that burned away his confusion. "You beat him to the ground a few minutes ago. Care to finish the task, hmm?"

"What the _fuck_ is wrong with-"

Smooth as a lunging cat, she slid forward and her hand came up and cupped the red, raw mess of his burned cheek. He stiffened and breathed in hard as he felt those soft, perfect hands touch his ugliness, and hated himself all the more for inflicting that on her. No, no! That was not what would happen today! _She_ had betrayed _him_ , not the other way around! But she... whe was a wych. She must have been, because his words still stopped and when she spoke he could hear nothing else.

"Why?" Her voice was a whisper, low but urgent, eyes wide and desperate for an answer. "Tell me. Killing is killing, sweet is sweet, so why not?"

"Because...!"

Sandor barked the word but he couldn't finish. Because it was wrong. Because it was cruel. Because it served no purpose. Because he didn't do that anymore. Because there was no coin in it and he hadn't been ordered to and they were good people and... finally he just shook his head but when he did, he found his cheek leaning into her hand inexorably, eyes and gaze rolling skyward.

He found his answer in the blue sky, never more gorgeous and azure after the lead clouds had sheathed it for days. 

"... because I'm _not_ my brother."

Silence. He looked down, and found her smiling. It was sad, the kind he'd long hated for the pity he saw in them, but any upward curl of her lips was welcome to him at that moment. Her fingers caressed his cheek and Sansa looked down at his chest, taking a long breath. She nodded slowly, yet her eyes were still tense. Something else left to be said, he'd wager, and she seemed to think it would be even harder. Sandor's hand moved slowly, carefully... but it didn't hold her own. It went back to his side, and stayed there, flexing into fist then palm uneasily. 

He gripped that single stone of anger in his heart. He had explained himself. Now she bloody well could.

 

**SANSA**

"Iz... Iz nod ass bath ass iz luhkz..."

Sansa had to murmur the words silently back to herself, lips twitching curiously with each one, before she worked out exactly what the poor boy was trying to say. Then she snorted softly and rolled her eyes, stepping out of the maester's way as a surprisingly young man with a silver chain went about his calling. He was keen to prove his worth, and Sansa was grateful for that, watching him bustle around Niall with his purpled face and swollen eye and fat lip. 

"Well, it _looks_ bloody awful, Niall," she said, and grinned at his flush. Hearing a highborn swear?! Such scandal. Then her smile faded as she flicked a glance out the solar's window. "He should damn well know better..."

The maester gave her a sharp look and she threw it right back at him. After a moment his lips curled in disapproval but he went back to work, grinding some strange orange powder into some smelling liquid. Sansa's gaze drifted back out the window, to the pacing giant going back and forth, like a direwolf in a cage. 

_Still the hound, when he wants to be. Still so cruel._

"Sumf... Some..." Niall swallowed hard and stretched lips that screeched in protest, but he bit down the pain and sounded out his words carefully. "Something happened... last night... I think."

Sansa caught the hard look in his eyes. Niall clearly didn't _think_ anything. You don't need to when you _knew_. 

"Something that made... him unguh... angry..."

He stopped to wince and groan and unwisely explore his busted lip with his tongue, leave Sansa to study the boy with shrewd eyes. She heard Baelish's lilt in her head when she did. His cold ambition was well rid from the world, most certain, but he had his uses. A finer mentor in human weakness, she could not have hoped to have. 

_Does he know? Well, clearly he does. Has he been told? By Sandor? No, never. He worked it out for himself. Clever lad. That makes him dangerous. His has information; he has leverage; he has control. Over you._

Sansa frowned and shook her head. No, she couldn't believe that. Niall was not a sellsword. He had aided them before and shown courage and wit to do so. Sandor even insisted he come along, though why exactly he had not explained. As she looked on him now, beaten and mauled by the man she'd seen him look at with a sort of wary admiration, Sansa felt no fear from what he knew. 

"Leave us..."

Niall watched the maester go and when the door closed, his eyes were... not quite _Niall's_. Smarter. A touch colder. But not the reptilian avarice of Baelish. Just not quite as simple as those he presented to the rest of the world.

"The two of you..." He licked the one corner of his lips that weren't strained and bleeding. "... Lady Stark, I don't wish-"

"I don't know what we are," she said quietly, arms crossed over her chest. "And I'd not speculate, if I were you. Listening at tent flaps, are we? Or doors in the night?"

"N-No, my lady!" Gods, he actually tried to sit up straight. Sansa went over to him with a sigh as Niall yelped and his banged up leg collapsed under him at the sudden movement. "Shite... sorry... no... Lady Stark. I haven't. I guessed. I... forgive me, but when he struck me, I..."

Shame. She didn't know how much of it was just to soften his next words, like she'd play at when her mother caught her as a child and she really had to lay on the guilt, and how much of it were honest.

"You...?"

'I said..." He swallowed. Gods, he looked like he was confessing to treason. "... 'why don't you just kiss and make up?'"

Sansa became _Lady_ Sansa quite quickly. Her eyes widened, her lips thinned, her cheeks paled and Niall squirmed like she was about to eat him. That stupid, _stupid_ boy! What if someone _else_ had been listening?! What if Sandor had lost what little control he still had in that heated moment? Niall would end up like Bran or dead, and Sandor could accomplish both with ease. He looked away from her and Sansa finally got her breathing under control.

She spent half the night weeping into her pillow like a lovesick girl whose suitor had abandoned her; now she was angry enough to smother some stupid boy who tangled with The Hound. Gods, she was so tired of men and their bloody moods. It threw her own out of loop like a comet tossed high and then pulled and dismissed by passing suns. She shook her head and pinched the bridge of her nose.

"Niall... do I need to tell you how stupid that was?"

"Well... look at me."

"I am," she said, perusing him up and down... before finally tutting and shaking her head. "Don't do that again, Niall. Sandor is a prickly man at the best of times."

"You seem to make him more so."

Sansa looked at him sharply, and the curious, cocky grin in his eyes. _Far enough_ , she thought coldly. She wasn't Sandor, who could only answer with violence, and Niall was not the smartest hound she'd dealt with, not by far. "And don't be so eager to push your nose into affairs not your own, lad. Don't assume I don't know when you're pushing, either. I'm not Sandor."

Niall blushed a touch and shifted awkwardly on the bare bench. He was still wearing most of his clothes, save for the breeches rolled up so he could have a gauze around one bruised leg. He hardly looked frail, but now a little crestfallen at being spied so easily. Sansa sat at the end of the bed and sighed. 

"It's no great thing to know everyone's secrets, Niall," she said, as gently as she could. "It doesn't make you as happy or as powerful as you think. It just makes you lonely."

She thought of Baelish. The only way she could ever feel sympathy for him, even if it were but a fragment. 

"I understand, Lady Stark," he said, and as she began to turn for the door. "He's not so bad, usually. After... he stays with you. He's not happy, not the word I think, but..." She was looking at him. Through him. She could have smiled when he met her gaze and finished. "Well... look what happens when things go _bad_. That wouldn't be so if he didn't care... or so I'd _think_."

The boy smiled again, small and secret. _He will go far_ , Sansa thought wryly, _if some brute doesn't cut his bold tongue out first._

"Aye." She smiled back at him and sighed, looking him up and down almost like he was some troublesome child she couldn't bear to be angry with. "Rest. You won't have long, we'll be moving on in a few hours."

"Yes, my lady..."

Sansa left him there and walked down the winding stairs, deaf to her footsteps on the stone. Morning had found her bleary-eyed and without hope of peace. The sun had crept higher and higher and she could not force herself to sleep. Half of her did not want to; the other half was too frazzled and filled with noise to slip away. She didn't fear visions of a blood-splattered giant any longer; she feared his face, his broken and defeated look... 

Gods, even the thought of it now made her belly feel hollow. She'd not seen him so... hopeless in so long. Like he'd just given up. Not since the Blackwater. That had been the only time, when eldritch flames that had decimated an army, a legacy of the raving monarch that had sought to devour a city with it. Sansa had seen that same listless, empty look in his eyes that night, when he'd been drunk and snarling at her in his splattered white cloak. 

She saw it again last night. She'd caused it. She'd lain for hours and prayed, to the old gods, the Seven, anyone who would listen, that he would walk back in the door. That he'd hold her while she cried and told him how sorry she was, how wrong she'd been. He never came.

_Life is not a song._

"No," she whispered to herself as she came to the bottom of the stairs, gathering her thoughts. "It is not. But it doesn't have to be endless _weeping_ , either."

She held her chin high and thought her mother would like that. She marched... yes, that was the right word, across the mud and didn't care. _Sod it_ , she thought, taking a quick pleasure in her salty language (yes, Catelyn Tully would _not_ have approved). Lady Jonelle was thanked and she turned to Sandor with none of the fear and trembling from the last night. She took in his ruined face and his hard, pugnacious eyes, itching for a fight... and she gave him an order, damnit. Not because she was his lady, and he her sworn shield. But because she _didn't_ fear him. _Didn't_ hate him.

And finally, she had an inkling as to why.

_Now just to make him see it..._

She took what he said without comment, and half-knew what he'd say. Part of her dared to hope that his lust for blood and battle had abated since she'd last seen him. He'd been on the Quiet Isle for... the most of a year? Nothing but solitude and peace and reflection. She thought that any man could learn to gentle the rage within himself, given that time... but Sandor was not any man. He was Sandor Clegane, a singular warrior, and-

That word again. It gave her both pause and strength. She plowed on, words mad and inane and she almost laughed at his fluster, but she did not. She had to see this. Him, too.

"... because I'm _not_ my brother."

Sansa could have wept at the words. Gods... she was such a fool. So young in the ways of war and the men who fought them. Mayhap that did not make her _foolish_ , per se, but it made her jump to the wrong conclusions. She rested a hand against the chainmail chest before her. Cold and damp from the frozen air. But she could feel the steady, thumping beat behind it... and they way it skipped at her touch. 

"Forgive me."

She whispered the word and told herself that if he growled at her to say it again, she would jolly well slap him. But instead his hand finally moved... paused... _no, please, Sandor, please_... then she bit her lip when one sausage finger tilted her chin up.

His eyes were wary, but there was a crack in his armor, just enough for his confusion to give way to curiosity.

"Why should I?"

She breathed in sharply, not expecting him to be so blunt, even if it was... well, _him_. "Because I was foolish. I let my fear poison my mind and thus my dreams. I saw..."

Sansa swallowed hard. This would be the worst part, but she would not know peace unless he knew the truth. The hardest and cruelest part of it... and once that was spoken and laid to rest, exorcised forever, she would be free. Mayhap he could be, too. 

"I saw Gregor in the way you killed those men. Or I thought I did." She couldn't look up and see the disgust and the anger she knew would pour out his face. She didn't want to blackmail him with tears, nor have him see her weakness. So she gripped the cold metal links and pulled him closer, speaking into them harsh and low. "But I was wrong, Sandor. You're not like him. You don't kill because... because you just want to, and no-one can stop you. Because you like the way a man dies under your blade, and don't care who it is. Gregor was a monster, an animal, a raper and a murderer. You're a _warrior_ and worth a hundred of him. That's why I asked you those questions."

She looked up and saw anger churning in his eyes, but confusion also. Giving her the hope to smile as the wind blew black ink strands across his raw-steak face. 

"Believe me," she said, and touched his cheeks again, now using both hands to cup them both. "Please. I've seen you kill, Sandor. But it was to save me. I never saw you in battle, and the sight of it... all covered in blood and parts of men and-"

His hands came up gently and Sansa felt fear tremble through her and threaten to bring the shakes to her hands. But he didn't throw her hands away. He massaged her wrists and looked down at her, some hesitant understanding flaring in his frowning grey eyes.

"Not like the songs, is it?"

" _Nothing_ is like the songs, Sandor," she said, a little more firmly. "I've half a mind to make all minstrels soldiers before they write about heroic bloody battles."

He laughed, a rumbling eruption that became a crack of high laughter and now Sansa let the tears come, if only to shine wetly in her eyes, and of joy. 

"Mayhap that'd make 'em think twice."

"I'm sorry," she said, stroking his cheeks and brushing her thumb over his bottom lip, feeling the hot rush of his breath as he gasped lightly. "I know I was stupid. It... scared me, Sandor. You scared me, what you could do... how well you could do it... but it's part of you. I know you don't see it as bad, but-" 

"Sansa, you know-"

"Don't interrupt!"

"Damnit, girl, I know what you're bloody well riding at!" He glared down at her even as he held her wrists and his thumbs traced little circles over her pulse. His eyes were muddled and flickering here and there but found her again as he growled out: "I'm a killer, I've told you that fuck knows how many-"

"I don't care!"

_Stop, stop right now, before you-_

"I have to love _all_ of you, and that means the parts I _don't_ like, too!"

The weirwood's smile went from knowing to mocking. The birds stopped tweeting for a moment and even the squirrels seemed to nudge each other and watch the unfolding scene. Both of them reflexively glanced around to check for unseen spies... and found none. Oh, well, that was all right, then.

 _No. No, it is not._  

"You... You just said-"

"You don't have to say it back," she said quickly, cheeks matching the leaves strewn at her feet, afraid to look up and see his mocking expression. "I didn't... You'll just think I said it to make you happy and not be mad at you and I should-"

He claimed her. That was the only word she had for it. It was not just the pressing of skin to skin, even in that wet, warm, intimate fashion a kiss always was, or should be. He breathed deep of her as he kissed; he held her close as if to crush her into himself and he tilted his head to explore her mouth better and buried his hand in her curls until his rough palm was massaging her scalp. Sansa tingled at the sensation, surprise withered to nothing in a blast of fiery lust and-

Fraction by fraction, he pulled away. She almost groaned at the loss, the way their lips seemed stuck together and made an odd little tugging sound when they parted. When her eyes opened, his own were... utterly unmarred by his usual doubting frown. They were wide and all his soul did pour from them, fear and lust and disbelief and anger and everything else, but chief among them-

"Fine," he said against her lips, and smiled so broad and handsome she barely noticed the scars nearly touching her cheek. "I won't."

Sandor was true to his word, at least. He kissed her again, and the squirrels chattered in celebration and the birds flapped away through it all the grinning tree laughed and laughed with the whistling wind.

 

 

**JONELLE**

"Can't bloody well wait forever."

There was an affirmative grumble to her left, then the familiar _put-hiss_ of Castor spitting a thin brown stream of sour leaf into some convenient patch of mud. Just as familiar, Jonelle turned to him and frowned; Egdin grimaced and Salton smirked. Castor ignored the last two, then turned to her... and his grey-flecked cheeks promptly colored.

"Sorry, m'lady."

"And yet you _still_ chew that disgusting drabble in front of me." 

"Don't _spit it_ in front a' you, though."

Lady Jonelle Cerwyn pursed her lips in a manner most unimpressed and straightened on her pony. She wore riding boots and leather breeches and a chainmail coat under her heavy cloak. Her men were dressed likewise and their saddle bags were loaded with rations. Behind them, the household was turned out, shivering but scorning the cold, determined to see their hopes carried on to alliance and liberation. 

Around the smattering of Cerwyn, masses of Manderly's were preparing. Knights and horsemen had done milling and sleeping and packing. Now they were mounted and restless in their saddles, hundreds of eyes constantly flying back to the main hall, eager for Wylis and Kamber to conclude their final strategizing and let them _ride_ , damnit. Winter was coming on wings of ice and fangs of frozen stone, and would be no easier for the waiting. 

"My last bad 'abit, m'lady," Castor said, injecting just a shade of impudence into his reply, "'part from the drinkin' and the wenchin' and-"

"Gods, must I have the _three_ of you whipped?!" Jonelle snapped out, torn between fury and a deep, unwelcome desire to laugh until her sides burst as she watched her three proven, scarred shields dissolve into childish giggles. "Such bold talk from your station! Unthinkable..."

"Aye, mebbe," Salton said in a murmur, "But methinks not un _speakable_..."

Jonelle turned from them, only so they could not see her lips squirm and her battle with it _not_ to smile, for buggery's sake! Don't let the sods win...

Fortunately, two fresh faces provided ample distraction. Jonelle didn't need her men oh-so-subtly clearing their throats to point out Sandor Clegane and Lady Stark returning from the godswood, hidden beyond the stables. The lady smiled discreetly behind her hand. Ach... shouldn't she be more angry with her? Was that not the proper way to act? They had walked back there with stern faces and eyes fit for a brutal warring of the soul, Sandor's body all tense edges and Sansa's own the barely-bridled indignation that served her house well. But now they returned, and...

Not holding hands, nor embracing. But sharing a secret, furtive smile as they lowered their faces. Walking slowly, enjoying each other, as if the cold and the mud and the snow meant nothing. Heads otherwise held high, shoulders back and relaxed, and the look on Clegane's face was...

"Bloody Hell," Salton muttered. "You don't suppose they-"

"Enough, Salton," Jonelle snapped out, in the tone she rarely used but was universally known among her household as _I am done joking and you **will** remember your place_. "She is a daughter of House Stark, eldest girl to Ned and Cat, and you will _not_ speak so of her."

"Sorry, m'lady."

Jonelle just hummed vaguely in reply, but didn't take her eyes off the couple (and gods, that was the _only_ word to describe them) sauntering from the godswood with their turmoil resolved. As they came from the courtyard so recently stained with Niall's blood, their attitude changed as if a cold blast of air had hit them. Their smiles straightened. Their eyes focused. Sandor held back a few steps and followed at his lady's back and side, every inch the dutiful, watchful shield. Jonelle found her own gaze sweeping quickly across the massed Manderly's, seeking... some sign of understanding.

Little to none, and odd enough, she was relieved. She made a note to talk with the girl later. She did not know the details, but the broad idea was clear enough to her. She didn't like it. The man Clegane was... a gifted killer, perhaps, but his soul had a rot in it. That much could be seen from his treatment of-

"Niall? Are you fit to ride?"

A limping figure that she'd scarcely noticed turned at Lady Sansa's words and she saw Niall's face. Gods, had he really come down from the solar by himself, with a battered leg and a head probably feeling three sizes too large? Jonelle cocked an eyebrow and let a little half-smile grace her face. Very impressive. But it soured when his hopeful face saw Sandow with her, and his fingers groped for his pony as if he were to mount it and flee-

"Can ye ride, boy?"

"Y-Yes, Clegane, I-"

"Got yer sword?"

The boy was trembling. He was frightened and pale and couldn't look the scowling man in the eye. Jonelle's lips curled inwards in distaste and she spurred her horse onward. She would not abide this, not in her sodding castle.

"Well, you need another one."

She stopped. Niall just blinked. 

"Se... what? Clegane, I-I'm sure my-"

Sandor raised an amused brow and walked swiftly over to Stranger, pulling a long bundle from the snorting warhorse. He strode over and shoved it in the bemused Niall's hands, earning a grunt from him as the boy staggered back. Sansa watched it all with a cool eye, probably wondering the same as Jonelle: what was Sandor hatching, here?

"My l-Clegane, what-"

"Gods, boy, just fucking open it..."

Niall did as he was told... and his eyes grew wide as hen's eggs. A sword fine in make and weight and character was in his hands. Niall the carter, lowborn and wide-eyed, may have not known its worth, but Jonelle certainly did. She saw filigree in the wood grip that was not too smooth, sanded enough so a gloved hand could grip it well enough. Silver capped the bottom of it and even as Niall held it at both ends, she could see the width of the blade was perfectly tapered from tip to hand guard, and the length of the hilt... a fine balance. It was a highborn's weapon, worth a harvest's bounty for a carter from White Harbor, and yet...

"My... My lord-"

"Got it off that Frey cunt who traveled her under my arm," Sandor growled on, of course unwilling to either accept praise or soften his language. "He don't need it no more, and I got my own. Not partin' with 'em just yet. So, I thought you could use it."

Niall looked up, and his fear was banished. All who watched knew an apology when they saw it, but few could believe it was Sandor Fucking Clegane doling it out. Whenever he saw a stunned expression his eyes narrowed and shot striking sparks, forcing the watcher to look away. Except for Jonelle. She could not turn and watched as Niall did, of course, what a smallfolk was meant to do... and gave away his riches to one he thought as better.

"Clegane, I ca't take this. I'm not good enough."

"You're getting better. Keep practicing and we'll see."

"B-But this is a highborn sword! Probably has a name and everything! Like... I dunno... Glorymaker, or something..."

Sandor regarded him with something between amusement and disgust, eyes closed a touch by the snow coming down harder. The sun rode high in the sky but the drifting flakes from distant clouds still carried, proof of the powerful winds that spurred them. He reached out and grabbed the bastard by the hilt, lifting it up easily in one hand as flakes smeared and slid against the gleaming silver blade, even cut in half as they fell on the keen edge. 

"Aye... Frey cunt probably was the sort to name his sword." He snorted in derision, turning the sword this way and that, letting it catch Niall's eyes with every flash and flutter of low Winter sun on steel. "But naming a sword doesn't mean a thing, boy. Sword's a piece of sodding metal. It's not a person, it doesn't have hates or wants or fears or hungers. Just a big, sharp, dead piece of hammered out rock from the ground. It's the man that matters. Give a good sword like this to a bad man, he'll do evil things. But..."

Sandor flicked the bastard sideways and it spun in mid-air as if on an axis, and his other hand-

-caught the blade of it halfway down the bottom, then extended it to Niall... with the blade pointing at his stomach, and the hilt at Niall's face.

"Give it to a good man, and he can do _great_ things."

Sansa's mouth parted in surprise, and her eyes shone and she didn't bother to hide it. Jonelle's eyebrows rocketed up so hard it seemed like they were trying to escape and fly up to the sky. Her sworn shields exchanged looks ranging from _impressed_ to _fuck me, where'd he learn all that_. Sandor himself just cracked a smile that twisted his ruined lips and his eyes glittered like grey diamonds, as if his whole speech were some great, secret joke. It may well have been, for all she knew... but still, Niall's eyes were wide and she could see the conviction planted in them.

_A man's choice. His actions. His hands._

"You..." Niall lowered his voice so Jonelle could barely hear. "You think I am one?"

Sandor's eyes softened, only for a fraction. Regret, mayhap, but it could have just been the strange sheen the snow cast. 

"Not for me to bloody answer, is it?"

Niall took the sword just as the great hall's gates swung open with a creak and a crack. The leaders of House Manderly strode out, liveried and armored, fed and faces hard and set and hungry, if not for beef and goat and cheese and bread. Squires helped them to their mounts and as Wylis passed, he saw Jonelle and she braced herself. She rehearsed the line she'd practiced all morning. About her father and brother - _he'll like that one, but don't press it too hard_ \- and about her lands, and how she had a right to fight... oh, but most of all how it was her castle and she could _not_ be ordered in it and-

"You'll be accompanying us, I take it, Lady Cerwyn?"

Jonelle blinked and those scripts burned up in a moment. She gulped and hid her composure, but the slow smile on the fat lord's face spoke of wry understanding.

"Yes, I... ahem... I will be, my lord. My shields and I."

"I don't suppose I could persuade you to stay with your people, and the wounded?"

Jonelle thought a wry smile might help, but her mood was far too tense to accomplish it. She shook her head and her horse did the same and drops of half-melted snow were sprinkled at their feet. "No, Lord Wylis. Not in this affair."

Wylis turned to Kamber, who smiled and shrugged... to Oprey, whose lips squirmed like duelling worms until he eventually looked away... another lord or ser who shook his head outright... but when he turned back to her, his eyes danced with amusement. And respect. She saw that too, and only then did she hazard a smile.

"We ride to restore the daughter of Ned Stark to her home," he said, loud enough for the men to hear him and his words bounce off the stout walls. "How can we turn back another lordly lady, who wishes her own vengeance?"

Cries of "aye!" and "nay!" rang through the air, and Jonelle wondered just how they'd understood the question. But her smile became a beam, like captured sun, that made all the homely plainness of her features beautiful for a moment, when she understood Wylis' decision. It was a hard ride and it would be hard weather, and death would wait for them at the end of it, The Stranger grinning and extending his hand... but she would be there.

She thought of her father. Her brother. Her people, gone to war, many never to come back. 

She thought of proud, wise, just Ned Stark and iron-willed Catelyn, brave young Robb and wild Rickon and the ever-climbing Bran. She thought of that dead-souled Roose and his rabid bastard and scheming, snickering Freys. 

_That they are dead while their murderers live... no more. The North remembers._

She thought of the ax strapped to her back, and found herself locking eyes with Sandor Clegane, now horsed after assisting Lady Stark.

A half-smile pulled his lips up on his good side for as long as it took a man to twitch, and he nodded sharply. She nodded back and Wylis chuckled.

"On we go, my lady. Three days to Stannis, Ser Kamber tells me, and I for one am eager meet him."

"As am I, Lord Wylis."

Soon they were, five hundred horse plowing through drifts of snow and carts carving trails through the churned mud behind them, heading north and east, driving slow but ceaseless next to the Knife with ice chunks like barrels bobbing in it. Leaving the stone walls behind and pressing towards the looming black smears of mountain and forest, cloaked in grey and massing clouds.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And lo! The fluffies did return, and the angst was banished FORTHWITH! Harken and know, brethren, that 'mongst the shippers, there was much rejoicing...
> 
> Anywhoozles, anyone think this chappie was too long? I thought about just having the first two POVs, but I REALLY wanted to get Jonelle's POV squeezed in to show Sandor's interaction with Niall, too. Oh, and please tell me what you think of their "resolution" from a plotting/characterization standpoint. I'm fresh from Song of Southron County and CW ALWAYS inspires and intimidates me to level up when it comes to character psychology.


	23. Chapter 23

**THE SISTER**

She wanted this. She'd begged for it. Thrown herself on the mercy of a merciless man when it became clear that ransom was not an option. She could have emptied the hold of her ship and he'd not have cared for her price; his mind was made and the sentence passed. All that mattered now was the form of death, and when she'd heard what he planned for her brother, and why, she'd bent her knee a second time and made one, final plea.

The sword. On the stump of a weirwood. Fast as a flying arrow and clean as a death in sleep. 

Despite it all, through it all, and always, Asha loved her brother. She'd not see him to flames, screaming for a drowned god that would not help him. And, at least, he would die near some kind of water. 

The tiny islands were like a scattering of boulders in the lake; they poked up through the water, clumps of trees and shrubs clinging to them, barely flat enough for a boat to even land on, let alone man walk on. But the one bearing the thick, white trunk of a weirwood... that was flat enough. Almost half an acre, to her eyes, studded with the sad, low stumps of trees long cut down, most of them hidden by the snow drifts to they were just vague humps of white. She'd been half-hopeful to feel rolling wood under her feet again, but of course, that wasn't necessary.

The lake was frozen solid. Everything was. All that was green and living had vanished. The weirwood trunk looked like some queer plant forged from the very season, Winter finding yet another form aside from snow and ice. A score of men trooped across the ice to the island that was no longer an island, and none of them showed a fear of it breaking. She felt her heart shudder once or twice when the ice groaned under her, but it passed quickly. 

She would not dread a death in water. It would do naught but pull her down to the Drowned God.

That said, she didn't _ignore_ the thinner expanses of the lake, either.

Stannis was leading the procession, two guards behind him, their prisoner shuffling between them. The dour, unsmiling man with eyes as frigid as the snow he trudged through had a greatsword slung over one shoulder. The five foot blade looked almost like a spear from a distance, and she thought it was a somewhat theatrical pose. But she understood it; she understood power, and politics, and wrangling men, and what were those things if not a breed of theater? 

Stannis' own clutch of lords from the Stormlands were back in their tents or the huts they'd claimed, shivering under mountains of furs and blankets. Every man with them now was a Northern lord, or a towering giant from these same mountains, with a beard down to at least his breastbone and bareheaded scorn of mere cold. They marched grimly to the weirwood, patiently but she could see the eagerness shining in their eyes, the disgust every time their eyes landed on the ruined, ravaged, wreck that used to be her brother.

He killed Ned's children. He betrayed the man they'd sworn allegiance to, that had treated him with such care that he'd long since become more than just a hostage to the Starks. The savagery inflicted upon him was not enough for those hard men.

The man who'd only just remembered himself as Theon Greyjoy was pushed to his knees in front of the weirwood stump. He didn't seem to understand at first, but the memory stirred in him. She could see his eyes cloud over in recollection... mayhap he'd seen Stark do similar to a man? Then they were wide with fear and he trembled. She swallowed hard and clenched callused hands more like a man's.

_Don't die badly, brother._

The man who would be king - and, in his mind, already was - stepped to his side and leather sighed on steel for long, agonizing moments as the greatsword was freed from its scabbard. It was from one of the mountain clans, a massive two-handed beast that could cleave a horse's head off. Theon looked up and his eyes dripped a silent plea.

Asha had to fight hard not to sneer. The boy would never learn, even moments before his end.

"Theon Greyjoy," Stannis said in that voice so tight and controlled you wouldn't believe its body pumped blood. "You've been found guilty of the murders of Rickon and Brandon Stark, rightful sons of Lord Eddard Stark of Winterfell."

 _He's been guilty for years_ , Asha thought wryly. She understood the reason for this, the terrible logic behind it all. The northern lords and the mountain clansmen - the latter of whom now made up most of Stannis' army - wanted Theon's head. Keeping him alive for information was one thing, but keeping him a prisoner _after_ it was gained? They would desert Stannis, and leave him to freeze with no real army, in woods they didn't know and with no idea how to bear a Northern WInter. Theon had to die, but only when his purpose was fulfilled.

That day had come.

"I, Stannis of Houses Baratheon of Dragonstone, First of My Name, King of the Andals and the First Men, Lord of the Seven Kingdoms, Lord of Light and Protector of the Realm, sentence you to die."

Again that smirk threatened to surface, but now there was no humor in it. She was as much Stannis' prisoner as Theon, and she'd listened to him rant in his subdued, relentless way about how it was his "lawful right" to the Iron Throne, and that all claiming otherwise with his enemies and usurpers. Asha could see how easy it was to believe a man so cold and stern would be driven by such a lifeless, legal clause, rather than his own stirrings. But she was not fooled. There was was no mistaking the way his tongue lingered on that title, every part of it, when he spoke it. The light in his eyes that flared like gold under the waves, and the greed men felt for it, so strong they'd drown in diving for it.

Asha knew from her father and her uncles just how much hate brothers could bear for each other; how far resentment could drive a man. She saw that same dark ambition in Stannis. 

Theon let out a low, keening sound like a frightened animal and Asha closed her eyes. Harsh, scraping laughter bubbled around her. She struck her jaw tight and still and did not turn to face it; wouldn't give the bastards the satisfaction. Stannis pointed to the block.

"Lay your head, or have it pressed."

The two guards tensed. The ones flanking Asha did the same, as if they would be needed to subdue a man even slighter and lighter than her, missing finger joints and teeth and unable to move in anything but a jerking, crippled, shambling gait. Asha chewed the inside of one of her cheeks, and prayed to a god far from these frozen wastes. He'd never spoken to her and she didn't expect him to now. But still, after a moment, her lips moved with her mind, hoping he'd at least listen.

_Please, give him the strength to show these green land bastards how a Greyjoy dies if he must. Please..._

Theon gulped, ball in his throat looking like he was swallowing an egg... and slowly, he rested his head on the stump. His shoulders still bobbed but he presented the back of his neck, lined with scars long-faded, shackled fists clenched so hard behind his back that his knuckles were white peaks on the back of them. Stannis hefted the huge blade, testing its balance with both hands and resting it above the boy's neck. He raised it half a foot... lowered it... raised it a whole foot... lowered it again.

Asha knew that would be enough to get a proper balance for the blade. Enough to know where it would land after you hurled it down from above and behind you head. The last thing Stannis wanted was a sloppy execution: it would make him look incompetent to the northerners. 

Slowly, as if he were drawing out the moment, Stannis raised his sword until it was a silver slash in the sky, so all could see it. 

Her eyes flickered to the ice, and the distant, hidden western horizon beyond the trees. She heard crashing waves and smelled the salt and tasted its water. Remembered how she'd choked on it when she'd been reborn, her uncle with his wide, mad eyes babbling about her. Asha felt a pang of pity for the decrepit-before-time creature that hunched over the weirwood, almost curled around it for protection. 

She wanted to take him from that stupid green lander stump and hold his head under the water until the bubbles ceased to froth. Send him to the hall of the Drowned God like one of his people, with a plea on her lips for that harsh deity.

_He only ever tried to be his father's son, when he should have tried harder to be his own man._

Then she looked back to her brother, and did not look away as-

Horns blasted from the camp behind them. Every head turned, from the executioner-king to his condemned and his lords. First one deep roll, then another, and more until the camp was alive with the sound of it. There was a clank behind her and Asha's head whipped around, heart refusing to beat-

Stannis had lowered his sword. Theon was sitting up and peering through the morning mist, seeing only the vague and fuzzy daemon-lights of their camp... and the shadow figures running here and there. One came running from it, calling at the top of his lungs

"Riders! Your Grace, riders approaching! Approaching from the east!"

"Colors?"

"Manderly, my lord," the shivering Stormlander stammered out, dressed in mail and livery and a thick swaddle of furs lashed to him with rope. "S-Seems like a f-few hundred, at-at least. K-Knights."

"Bolton."

Stannis spat the word thick with disdain, but also an edge of anticipation. He'd smashed the bastards once, now Asha knew he was eager to do it again. His starving army had eaten well that day on rations looted from Frey corpses, celebrated and felt their spirits rise for a victory. Theon's execution was to be the last order of affairs to be resolved before the camp was struck and they marched again.

Now Bolton had decided to make their journey all the shorter.

"Make ready the men," he growled at no-one in particular, knowing someone would listen. His greatsword went back to its scabbard and a hulking clansman claimed it as Stannis walked past. "Return the prisoners to their cell."

Asha felt her jaw drop a fraction. Prisoners. More than one. He would not have another take her brother's head instead, not until after this fresh battle was won. The northern lords and their clansmen allies strode swiftly after their king, clansmen already growling likes wolves with a scent. The stoic guards picked up her brother and as he passed her, a shaky flickering of his lips that was almost a smile greeting her.

She smiled wide but it did not touch her eyes. He was still a dead man. Condemned to die by Stannis, and so he would. Damn it... she'd been ready for his death. That bastard Stannis had dragged it out and held his sword over her brother and she'd prayed for something, anything, even past the end of all hope. Now she had to witness it all again. 

The guards at her side shoved her forward and she made a note to remember their faces. For when she was free. The six of them trudged across the lake, ice thick as bricks under their feet, and Asha swore she could already hear an avalanche of hooves. 

 

**THE KING**

"Looks like they wonna parlay, yer grace."

Stannis didn't know exactly how, but he always suspected he was being politely mocked when Mors used his title. Coming from the great shaggy northerner, the words didn't have any of the weight and gravity Stannis expected. Instead they were spouted with about the same reverence that Umber would use for one of his hounds. Stannis frowned but did not speak on the slight. He made a note, however. To be dealt with at another time.

Preferably when there wasn't an army before them, first.

Five hundred horsemen were standing in a thick row, maybe half a league beyond where they stood. Stannis and Lord Florent and Mors Crowfood sat astride their own horses, but the rest of their men were on foot behind them, arranged in a rough half-circle with the village at their back, and the narrow, island-spotted lakes at their sides and partway front. Even Donnel Flint, heir to the largest clan Stannis had, preferred to trudge in his deer hide boots, greatsword nearly as long as he was grasped in melon-sized hands. 

Something about not liking horses. Stannis suspected it was more about hardly seeing them, trapped up in the mountains.

The horsemen had not moved towards the ice, though. Stannis supposed their outriders had gone on ahead and found out that the ground under them was no longer ground. A man wearing plate and mail, carrying a shield, lance and sword, _and_ riding a horse along with a few _hundred_ of his fellows at the same time would go straight through it, just like the battle a few days prior.

Stannis allowed one corner of his mouth to tug slightly; the closest he could come to smiling these days. The Freys and Manderly's had thought his starving, frostbitten men easy meat, too. Then they'd started vanishing into the ice holes, battered by the blood-maddened clansmen, driven into a chokepoint by the lakes, then finally flanked and shattered by the few score mounted knights he'd had left... and now their bodies were fat, blue-black memories, buried under the snow.

_These men are being more careful. And I see none but the banners of White Harbor._

"Mayhap you're right, Lord Umber," he said, voice tight and tense, not just from the cold that seemed to freeze his tongue whenever he opened it. His cloak was billowing around his back like it was trying to escape him, but he would not tighten it nor fasten his hood. The clansmen and the Umbers would not; he could not look weaker than them. "But I'll wait until I see a messenger before-"

His words cut off when he saw five figures separate from the group line and begin to amble gently forward. One of them ranged a little ahead, rider staring down hard at the ground as if looking. No, _Stannis_ thought. _Checking_.

Whoever he was, he had courage. He rode ahead on faceless, unfamiliar ground and knew there was a chance he and his mount would plunge down through the cracking ice and sink deep, faster than he could ever get his armor off. Certain death, and yet he still cantered onward...

"That a white flag?"

Young Flint didn't even bother with the "your grace". Another slight remembered. Stannis could see the lance held by one man, white rag fluttering atop it. His brow knotted further until it was a dark, wrinkled valley between his eyes. He did not understand this. Manderly banners, but no Bolton, though Lord Wyman had sworn his house and kin to the new Warden of The North. Horsemen and knights, but unsupported by archers or spearmen. No decent commander would throw all his hopes into one without retaining the flexibility of the others... and armored knights were hardly suited to snow drifts and frozen ground.

_Yet still, they come here, array their forces, and send forth men to parlay. Something else is at work here._

Not for the first time, Stannis wishes he had Davos and Melisandre by his side. He whispered the thought, as if even the admission to himself was a weakness, or could be heard by the hard men at his side. Davos, the honest smuggler. Melisandre, the devoted priestess. Both saw something great within him, though they could never agree on what that was. Stannis knew they despised and feared each other... but they were loyal. Loyal beyond any others he had at his command. Now Davos had vanished to White Harbor and Stannis feared - oh, yes, he did fear when it came to the Onion Knight - him dead, and the Red Lady was at the Wall, her powers magnified there, so close to the crackling currents of wyrd from the far north.

Stannis wanted them with him now. Not one or neither; both.

"Follow me..."

He shucked his horse onward but made a point to go slower than the Manderly men ahead of them. Better they meet up with them closer to his own lines. Stannis at least knew _he_ would try no treachery; he could not make the same statement of the men approaching. 

 _Mostly men, anyway_ , he thought, frowning as he saw the feminine curves on one... no... no, one of the armored figures had streaming brown hair, too, and the softness in her face of a woman. Three knights, two women... 

The rider in black armor got closer and Stannis could make out his features. Ah... there was no mistaking _that_ face. But what was the Lannister's loyal killer doing in the North, and riding with the Manderly's, of all houses? A strange house, a stranger retainer, women in the parlay... Stannis was beginning to wonder if this wasn't some dream formed from a bad cutlet of fish. 

"The bloody hells is _that_ thing?"

"Sandor Clegane," Stannis said, bringing his horse to a stop, the rest of his little party doing the same. "A Lannister man."

"Not a ser?"

"No, just a soldier."

That hideous visage was clear to them all now as it came to a stop, waiting for his fellows. Sandor Clegane swept his calm grey eyes over the rightful King of the Seven Kingdoms, a giant Umber, the Lord of House Florent and a stout, stocky, glowering mountain clansman... and a slowly raised his eyebrows.

"Mornin'."

Stannis blinked a few times, then decided that, yes, his ears were working just fine, and he had just heard that. Next to him Mors Umber's face split into a toothy grin, remaining eye twinkling. Lord Florent predictably glared. Flint just blinked. Bloody strange folk, these low landers. 

"Clegane," Stannis said, doing his best to sound bored rather than curious. "Long way from your usual haunts, are you not?"

"Dont have any usual haunts anymore," Clegane said, patting his mount on the neck as the stallion snorted a greeting at the strange horses in front of it. "Not welcome in the south. Barely welcome in the north."

"And yet you arrive in the edge of a battle. I suppose that shouldn't surprise me."

That drew a wry smile from the Clegane, the one that Stannis could stand to be around, anyway. Then again, he supposed that was hardly high praise. He'd met cannibals and rapers and wildlings and sellswords, but none of them had come close to the festering, bottomless cruelty that had poured from the eyes of Gregor Clegane. Boasting that you were the _good_ brother in that family was like saying you were pleasant compared to the Great Other himself.

"How well you bloody know me... Your Grace."

Stannis blinked again. How very odd.

Then the other riders were there, by Clegane's side, and Stannis took them in, one by one. A fat man with a walrus moustache, sitting high in his saddle, a lord by rearing and temperament. The rider holding the lance had the look of a ser; a man who'd been holding one for years, and didn't feel comfortable without it. A woman who wore nothing feminine was next to him, leather breeches, dagger at her hip, ax within easy reach on her saddle and chainmail covering her broad chest. Full-faced, but not soft, not to Stannis' eyes. His wife's will but without the fanaticism. 

The last one. Next to the fat lord. A girl, barely into womanhood, and she lowered her hood when they stopped, letting Stannis and his men and his army see the hair that reminded him so much of Melisandre. But where hers was burning red, deep and bloody, hers was lighter, auburn, burnished and shimmering even in the dank winter light. Stannis frowned. A great beauty, perhaps, but... no, something else familiar about-

"By the gods..." He turned sharply and saw astonishment send Mors Crowfood's jaw to the ground, making his vast white beard shake. "Lady Stark?"

Stannis turned sharply and remembered her smiling face from long ago. Fuller in the face, of course, like any child would before those painful years when the body was stretched and hewn by itself. But he remembered those eyes, and the way she'd clung to her father the whole time. Memory faded and grim, ruthless reality of the day replaced it. Stannis' face was a mask. Behind it, his mind whirred. A Stark. An heir. Not some distant objective like the Bastard's unwilling bride, but there, close and willing, and with a bloody army at her back, by the looks of it. 

He understood in a broken moment. Why they had chosen parlay, and the gesture of unveiling herself when she was close enough. He cursed himself for bringing Mors; mayhap Young Flint would not have recognized her, but Mors would, and now within an hour, every northerner in his army would be buzzing with the miracle of the eldest Stark daughter, returned to them safely.

_They follow me because of a Stark. To save one. Now there is another, older, with a better claim, within their grasp... and they will not need me anymore._

Stannis fingered the hilt of his sword, almost instinctively. All his plans seemed to be crumbling, and all the damage seemed to stem from the girl with the hair of a heart tree's leaves.

 

**SANSA**

_Once more I present myself as a whore to be bid upon._

Sansa knew she should have felt more trepidation, being so close to a king and his army, but all she felt when she let down her hood was a flaming flash of bitterness. It seemed that all she did now was be _seen_ , and be seen as a _Stark_. How was that different to the role she'd been forced to before? Pledged to Joffrey, pulled between Highgarden and the Lannisters, whisked away by Baelish who assured here he'd use her name and her marriage to reclaim the North... all of it smacked of property changing hands. None of it had to do with _her_.

She had learned much from Baelish, from Tyrion, from Sandor. She was a world and its moon away from the know-nothing girl that had first come to King's Landing. But none of them cared. None of them saw.

_None but him._

She could not see his face, and it struck her many, if not all, would have seen that as a blessing. Not her. She wanted his eyes on her. The way they steeled her and melted her at the same time. The confidence she saw in them; the faith he had in her. Even now she felt like a dwarf among giants, looking into the bright, cold eyes of Stannis Baratheon, yet because he was there, across an arm's length of snow and biting air, she knew what she had to say.

She cocked her head to one side and took in the gobsmacked man on a bow-backed horse who she could swear was part-giant. "Umber" immediately boomed in her mind, with the voice of The Greatjon. 

"I take it you are of House Umber, my lord?"

"Aye, that I am, my lady. Mors Crowfood, at yer service."

Stannis' head snapped to him so sharply she heard a crack above the whipping wind. _Ah. So it begins._ She swallowed hard and remembered the lines she had rehearsed, by herself and with Wylis and Jonelle. This meeting was so crucial for all of them, and she could not afford any mistakes. 

"I thank you, Mors," she said, loud enough for Stannis to turn his gaze back to her. "But I know your word is already pledged to King Stannis. I'd not stand in the way of that."

"Oh? Stannis said, injecting a scroll's worth of doubt into one syllable. "Yet here you are... with your riding companions?"

"Lord Wylis Manderly, Your Grace," the portly lord of White Harbor said, managing an awkward bow while horsed. "With Ser Kamber to my right and Lady Jonelle of House Cerwyn to my left."

Knight and lady nodded their respect and Sansa studied Stannis closely. Ah, Baelish... how great a man you could have been, had you a soul in your breast. She watched the man's eyes contract and then widen, digesting what he was seeing. He saw his hand caress the hilt of his sword, taking solace in the warlike tool while his mind was still trying to fathom all this. She recalled Wylis' words the night before, in his grand tent that was still freezing, all of them bundled in furs and huddle around a fire. 

_"He will fear and mistrust you, Lady Stark, for what you are and what he thinks you want. He will think you mean to steal the loyalty of his Northerners, thus destroy his army and his chances at the throne. You must show him that is not the case. Once he sees our intent for what it is, the rest will be easy."_

Sansa had chuckled and muttered "apart from laying siege to Winterfell and the Dreadfort".

"Ser Kamber led the Manderly knights that were with the Freys assaulting you days before, Your grace," she said, making another note not to stuff "Your Grace" onto the end of _every_ sentence. Stannis was not a man amenable to empty flattery; it would only close his hand tighter rather than have him extend it. "But now he rides with the rest of his house, and they ride with me."

"And who are _you_ , my lady?"

Sansa doesn't flush or look away. She doesn't let her confusion or her anger show. That's _exactly_ what he wants, and what he wants to prove. That he is king and she is just a shivering girl far from home. So instead she smiles and tilts her chin higher. 

"I am Sansa Stark, eldest daughter of Lord Eddard Stark. And I'm damn well taking back what's _mine_."

The king stared at her and she thought there was a glimmer of respect there, hidden behind the stone, stoic walls of his eyes.

"From a fortified enemy of thousands, with six hundred knights and no siege equipment? I would have thought your fellows would have schooled you better on the ways of war."

"No," she said smoothly, not rising to his disdain and raising a hand without looking back, to still the outrage she knew would flare on the face of her comrades. "With _your_ army, and a plan that will either doom me or restore me to my home." 

Ah, she could see the outrage in his face now, though it was more more controlled. The tightening of his jaw, the shifting of his teeth, the way he gripped his sword tighter and his spine seemed to solidify like the wind had seeped through his skin and into it. She saw Sandor drop one hand casually down, dangling over one stirruped boot... and the bone-handled knife he kept tucked down it, out of sight. 

Sansa gulped, distracted as politics and scheming vanished for a moment. Now she saw only the violence shimmering around him, the decision she knew had been made so casually in eyes she could not see.

_Stannis pulls his sword, he'll have that dagger thrown into his chest before it can be raised. And then he'll kill the rest, if he must._

_No. We have come to far to fall apart now._

"You have no claim to-"

"You mistake me, King Stannis," Sansa said, words coming out harsher, harder, even as her heart beat wildly against her ribs. "I mean to pledge myself _to_ you, bend the knee and add these men to your army. Lord Wylis and Lady Jonelle have agreed to do the same. I know what you think, Lord Stannis, but it is not so."

He quirked an eyebrow and Sansa didn't let it slow her down. All the days of freezing cold, the men they'd lost in that frozen field, marching north to chase an army in the mountains and a hope that was so fragile... it all came to this. 

She thought of Tyber. The last breath he sighed with Sandor's blade in his heart. The peace on his face and a different dagger in her own chest, telling her she was the reason not just for their hope and their bravery, but for their deaths.

"I do not wish to be the Queen in the North, as my brother Robb sought to be the King." A strange, mayhap disappointed look passed between Umber and the stocky man with the too-large sword who stood next to him. "I have been a prisoner of monsters for far too long. My family is... almost gone, Your Grace. The home I was born in and love has been claimed by usurpers and traitors, the same men that jammed a sword into Robb Stark's heart. I want it _back_." 

Her eyes grew hard. Anger growled in her and it struck sparks off her voice, even in the freezing air.

"I want the Boltons wiped out and what Freys that are left tossed back across the causeway, if they're canny enough to surrender. Those that do not will be slaughtered. We want the same things, King Stannis, because the Boltons are lackeys to the Lannisters and will oppose you in the North. With them removed, you will have a foothold here, and you can continue your war for the Iron Throne. You will also have my loyalty, and as you know, that means all the North will give it, too."

She raised higher in her seat and felt a flush roll through her that had little to do with embarrassment or a reaction against the cold. She swept her eyes over the ranks of men behind Stannis, some of them giants in bear furs with swords as long as her, other men stocky and broad, carved from elm and oak, bearing staffs of the same that could break bones through chainmail. For every Stormlander in the Baratheon livery, she saw four of these bearded, rough-hewn northerners. 

Sansa felt a twinge, something insistent and whispering...

_They still want to be free from the South. From that ugly fucking chair. You could give that to them. Do you **need** Stannis? No... No longer. Not after Winterfell falls. How easy would it be, the the glow and exhaustion of victory, to turn their blades one last time against one last loose end-_

"On this, you have my word," she bit out, sounding to Stannis as if she were pledging a vow, but instead choking out that malicious little voice that had Baelish's lilt and stank of his bone-deep treachery. She gazed at the northerners at Stannis' sides. "We'll have Roose and his Bastard and whoever else stands with them quartered like dogs and their heads on pikes." She swallowed and found to her surprise she did not feel guilty. Worse, actually: she _longed_ for the sight. "Ned and Robb will be _avenged_."

There was silence between them, filled by Stannis' thoughts and the words that Sansa had not yet spoken. She didn't know if Stannis knew about Rickon and Bran... and chose to let him wait a little longer. She had heard he was far from stupid, but once his mind was made, he'd rather die than change it. She didn't want him pursuing some foolish idea about chasing down Rickon and waiting longer while the Boltons held Winterfell and his own army relentlessly consumed rations and men dropped from the cold like flakes from a rotting tree. 

"Why is _he_ here?"

Sandor. Stannis was looking at Sandor. Sansa hitched her horse forward a touch, the movement aimed to draw those granite eyes back to her.

"He rescued me from the man who held me prisoner in The Vale," she said evenly. Oh, but she'd practiced _these_ words, too. "He escorted me from there, through The Neck to White Harbor, then to this very spot. He is my sworn shield and I trust him with my life."

"He is known to be a pillager of the Saltpans and-"

"Wrongly accused of those crimes, Your Grace."

Stannis blinked in surprise, but Sansa did not redden. Wylis swallowed behind her, audible and wet. Jonelle cleared her throat. Sandor was he same, still and unreadable, brows set into the frown that all assumed was his default and waking expression. Sansa was careful to keep her retort smooth and factual, not the explosion of indignance she'd lashed Oprey with when he'd mentioned the vile gossip about Sandor. 

"Oh? And how do you know that?"

"He was on the Quiet Isle when those horrors were perpetrated. He abandoned his helm on the way there, throwing off his past life," she said, lying with confidence now, and the best part of it was, her words _were_ mostly truth. _Not lying, just... omitting certain details._ "The monks there will tell you the same."

"I note they are not _here_ to validate your tale."

"Then you can take the _word of a Stark_ , Your Grace."

What hint of mocking there was on Stannis' face vanished at the implicit challenge in her words. Sansa swallowed hard at his hard expression, as unforgiving as the cliffs of Dragonstone itself. She felt the tremors from her guts threaten to spill into her lungs, her mouth, her hands-

Sandor turned a touch. Enough for her to see one eye... and the look her shot to her, voice steady.

"No need t'fret for me, my lady," he said, words a low rumble and Sansa steeled her jaw so not to let it drop. Gods... had _everyone_ been practicing what to say to this dour bastard?! "Truth will out after. We need to get your home, first."

Then he turned back to Stannis, as did they all. The truth had been laid out for all to see, but Sansa knew that was not enough. It had to be _believed_ by one with the power and influence to make something of it, and that was Stannis. That whisper began again. He was a man far from his homelands, alone with a dwindling circle of allies, and most of them were only with him to pursue revenge against her own house... and now she was here. Need. Necessity. _Expediency_ , another of Baelish's favorite words that he'd taught her.

_I am not Baelish, and I am not playing that damn fucking game._

"You will bend the knee?"

Sansa felt relief flood through her as if her veins were pumping milk of the poppy. Behind her she could hear Wylis slump a little with the same. It was the tone of a man perhaps not convinced, but amenable. Needing only further assurance.

"I will, Your Grace."

"You will pledge allegiance to me and my rightful claim?"

"Winterfell returns to me, the Boltons are made extinct, the Freys expelled. Those are my terms, Your Grace. That is all I want."

She saw a smile flash across Sandor's lips, just before he bowed to hide it. Little bird dictating terms to the ruler of the Seven Kingdoms. She could barely believe it, either. Stannis seemed to regard her with the same surprise, eyebrows moving slowly, as if through thick mud, but definitely sky-bound.

"Few would dare to offer terms to their  _king_ , Lady Stark."

"Few have lost what I have, Your Grace," Sansa said in tones that were scraped clean of warmth and fear. Parents and siblings and friends. All dead, for the sake of greed and men grasping for their name's immortality. "And I am just the weapon you need to take Winterfell. From what Ser Kamber has told me, many of Lord Bolton's men only follow him because they believe the Stark children to be all dead, save for my sister, married to Ramsay."

She leaned forward a touch. Seduction was far from her speciality, but touching a man's ambitions with a needle... she could try at that. Stannis was a man well-accomplished at war. He would know a decisive advantage when he saw it. His want, that was what Baelish called it. Once you know what a man wants, you have him. But Stannis was not so easily won over.

"Prisoners have told us that provisions at Winterfell are beginning to run low. With the force I have now, I could starve them out in less than a month, no need to scale the walls and risk the casualties of storming them."

Wylis' voice in her head again. Kamber's. Jonelle's. Even Sandor, those few times he'd chipped in his opinion among the highborns the night before. 

"Less of a problem now he has a few thousand less Freys and Manderlys to feed, Your Grace, and your men are already hungry and frozen, are they not?"

"How did you-"

"I didn't," Sansa said with a quick smile. "I am of the North. I know her Winters. You do not. No man ignorant of them can weather them well, that is a simple fact. Think what will happen when those Northern lords who chafe under him see me at the gates of WInterfell. How long will their loyalty last? Already there have been brawls and squabbles, even _deaths_ , as house fights house. Bolton is losing control of his allies. The heir to Winterfell at your side, for all to see, will destroy it _completely_."

"And _that_ will open the gates?"

Sansa opened her mouth but-

"Aye. It will. In a way."

Sandor was the one who finished the sentence for her. Stannis' eyes snapped back to him, distrust stark in his eyes and back up like a sword guard. Sandor just smiled crookedly, a secret dancing behind his eyes and gods, didn't he just love holding that mystery before the man that prided himself on being The Chosen One?

"It seems..." Stannis said after a few moments, rolling the words around in his mouth, tone that of a man still deciding what piece to move on the board. Sansa held her breath, sweat threatening to sprout on her brow despite the blowing ice blanketing them. "... we have much to discuss."

Lady Stark smiled, nodded, and had to grip the reins of her horse to stop her hands from shaking.

"Indeed, Your Grace..."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, I know, more plottage than fluffage, but damnit, I need to acknowledge the setting without SanSan squishiness! Something sweeter coming up next, pinky promise. ;-)


	24. Chapter 24

_My Dearest Rickon,_

_I hope this letter finds you well and happy with your sister. The ravens here are not as well-trained as those a maester would have, so I was unsure if it would find you. But I have to try, do I not?_

_When you get this and you have read it, remember to copy out the words three times. When you return to Last Hearth, the two of us will read the copies together and we shall see if you have improved. I am sure you have, but practice makes you more perfect._

_There is still much talk of the raiders. Every day people come to the castle with stories of what they have done and where. But there are not so many as there once were. They talk more now of your warriors, and how you have hunted down and killed those bad men. The Umbers boast of you. Some of the wildlings do now. I think they still see you as one of them, if you pardon me saying so. They respect you, Rickon. I can see why._

_Remember to ask your sister about sending some stonemasons to Last Hearth, so we can build more houses before the weather turns. The wildlings have their tents and they can build, but not as strong or warm as your Northern masons. The Umbers' seat has grown so much since we were young, or at least younger. The wildlings seem to like the Umbers. Maybe because they are as loud and impudent as them. Ha ha!_

_I cannot think of much else to say that you need to hear so urgently. The harvest has done well. The river bears plenty of fish, and game is rich in the forest. Myself and the people here will not have to fear starvation when the Winter comes, I am sure of that. The walls are well-manned and I know you concern yourself with raider attacks, but I do not think they shall attempt one._

_I miss our lessons. You are my second to oldest student, and I have such fun teaching you. When you return, tell me all of Winterfell and what comes and goes in the world. I will enjoy that conversation. Are you reading the book I sent with you? Do not doubt that I will be questioning you on those pages when you return, also._

_The sun is low now, and so I must end this letter and go to bed, or the raven will not know where to go. Until we speak again, Rick._

_With Affection,_

_Shireen_

 

He read the letter again and again until he could have probably recited it from memory, but it was only fractions of it that seemed important. He knew, of course, that the news of Last Hearth was important. He needed to be made aware of the situation at that last bastion before The Ruins, where his army was camped and thousands of wildlings lived around. Shireen was far more than just the Learning Lady there: she was the eyes and ears of Winterfell.

But his eyes rested on the first words, and her eyes and her lessons came unbidden.

_Dearest. Not just 'dear'. When you add the 'est' letters, that means it... the thing, whatever it is, is the... most? Yes. Most dear to you._

Was that how she saw him? The thought had him blinking in the candlelight, trying to divine from ink and parchment the heart of a woman so far away, and so different to himself. Why would she write it if she did not think it? He licked his lips and frowned. Ah, so much like the girl. Her first... what was it called? Sentence. Yes. The first _sentence_ was solely about him. That she wished him health and happiness. But not two lines later, she was badgering him to continue his studies, and not let time and distance get in the way of what they shared.

Rickon sighed and the steel certainty he carried in his eyes faltered. He didn't know what they shared, but he knew what he wanted it to be. He would have scowled at her order, her command to him. Schooling him even from days away. But then his mind saw her in her cluttered study, overflowing with scrolls and books and charcoal diagrams nailed to the walls. She had taught herself so much over the years, and not just history and writings. Engineering. Irrigation. Crop rotation. Animal breeding and keeping. Useful things, for a people that depended on practical skills for survival, and all day, every day her house and her study would be peopled by those seeking to learn.

But she made time for him. They would sit at her desk after she cleared a space, sitting next to him as his fingers made torturous progress alone the little black lines of letters. She would chide him when he moved his lips to silently sound the words, but he hadn't stopped until that day she'd wrapped her slender fingers around his arm and her voice was in his ear, close enough for him to feel the fluttering heat of her words.

_"You won't learn with your lips, Rick. You learn with your mind. Make the words in there. Let that be the first thing you feel them with."_

He'd been tempted to move his lips again, just to see if she would touch him more.

The memory, the desire, made him frown deeper and push the paper away from him. He wasn't stupid; he knew what he was feeling. He just didn't like _how_ it made him feel. Hers was far from the only raven he'd received. Word from patrols in the far north and the Wolfswood had come to him in the days he'd been at Winterfell; mostly dry reports about troop movements and their tracking of the last pockets of raiding parties. Bloody tales, in a few of them. Enough to make him want to leave the seat of his Queen and ride forth, cut short his journey and avenge those lost.

But this one... he'd read it over and over. And each time he read it, he felt the fur fall from the Wolf Prince. He was that boy again when first they met, and he'd been near-rabid towards her. He'd gawked at her scales and vomited the same superstitious bullshit he'd been taught. Rickon remembered her tears; how he'd hurt her with his words, and would have given anything to dry them with yet more. 

_They respect you. I can see why._

_Ha ha!_

He smiled and showed his teeth, closed his eyes and heard her silver bell laughter in his ears, clear as the ravens cawing in the tower above him. The way she smiled proudly without showing her teeth, or breathless and flushed when she did. That time when a raven she was training got loose in her study and no, he was _not_ interested in getting back inside that camped little cage, so they'd spent an hour chasing him around the room. 

Scrolls flying, bird cawing, her laughing... his hand on her cheek where she thought it had scratched her.

Her eyes, blue as mountain springs, wide and robbed of all their knowing wisdom when he'd brushed the scales. Rickon knew fear very well, and he saw it in her eyes. Fear that he would jerk his hand away as if she were a leper. 

He didn't. They were... strange. Hard like warm stones, but he didn't pull away. Not when he'd brushed - no, he'd actually had the nerve to _stroke_ \- lower as there was the softness of her jaw and Rickon felt a tightness in his throat. 

He could have sodding _killed_ Carcer for barging in a moment later.

The Wolf Prince flexed his hand and rubbed his thumb against his fingertips. He could still feel her on them, if he thought hard. 

"Gods, this is fucking ridiculous..."

He covered his face with his hands and rubbed his closed eyelids with his fingertips. Late in the day for those kind of thoughts, running around his mind and not giving him any peace. The sun was a blazing blur on the horizon beyond the window, half of it sunk into the ground like a gold dragon stuck in the grass. Much to do tomorrow. His sister needed him, after Sandor had left and taken so much of her with him. That thought alone was enough to harden his heart again. 

Sandor. The man who have come for him when the monsters had-

He shook his head and threw away those useless memories. They couldn't hurt him anymore. He remembered only those shaking, bloodied but iron-like arms lifting him up and taking him away from the screaming flames. A face so hellish and monstrous, more so because the man who wore it was more knightly than knights. Then his eyes drifted back down to the parchment and-

_I miss our lessons._

_But do you miss me_ , he found himself wondering, eyes lingering on her neat, precise letters, just so because he knew she didn't want him to struggle in reading them. _Or am I just another student among hundreds you've had?_

I miss you. Rickon wanted to read _those_ words.  

_With Affection._

Rickon frowned and felt a queer, silly resentment. Affection. Well... that was _good_ , he supposed. That was something, if not _the_ thing he wanted.

As if she knew what he wanted to hear and denied it to him, for womanly reasons he had no hope of understanding. As if what he felt for her would always be greater and stronger than she she bore for him, and so he could never speak it. He could not name it and he did not know her heart, her wants. She was so full of wisdom and learning and letters. She wanted someone of a like mind, he was sure of it, and... what was he but a soldier? He'd turned down the crown years before, because he did not want it. It was... too big for him. He was still a child, and the idea of lords and ladies pledging to him, questioning him, asking of him like he were a god to grant rain and sun, it was too much. He fought, and he was damn good at it, and when a man excels at what he loves, he seeks nothing else.

Until that "else" becomes clear to him, unexpected and even unwelcome, but impossible to remove from his mind. Suddenly his skill with ax and bow and lance and sword wasn't enough. Not just for him, but for her. He knew that as certain, also. The idea of her hearing his confession, spoken from lips she'd seen slick with other men's blood... shaking her head at his words, looking away and... and _not_ speaking them back-

He nearly winced when a blade twisted in his guts and jerked up to the center of his chest. Stupid boy. Still a stupid boy howling in your bed at monsters long dead... but who had been at his side when he'd woken, and Sansa was not there to shush him to sleep?

The girl with dark, worried eyes and a scaled face.

"Carcer?" He didn't even need to shout, just raise his voice a touch, and within a heartbeat the door was open and Carcer was there. Dunn loomed behind him, both with hands on their weapons. Even there, in the heart of the kingdom, surrounded by bannermen and guards, they were never off duty. "I need parchment and ink."

"A letter?"

His lips curled at the chore ahead of him. But it was not such a thing, if it would purchase him an hour or two with her next to him. "Lessons."

Carcer made a "hmmm" sound that was far too knowing for Rickon's liking. "I'll get you a bolt, then."

"I don't think I'll need-"

"You make a lot of mistakes, and you throw away those ones, because you like showing her ones without any crossing's out" Dunn said with typical irregard for anything resembling protocol. He knew his master and his flaws, so he spoke them. How else was a man meant to conquer them; how else was a loyal retainer to serve? "You'll probably need it."

Rickon spared them a short glare and nodded. "Fine. A bolt. And fresh candles." 

He would not make so many mistakes this time. He wanted her smile. He wanted to show her that he _was_ a man of letters and wit.  

"Magar koth, Rickon Eruk Nag Stark."

_As you speak, Rickon Wolf Born Stark._

They left and the boy grown to man smiled softly. His Skagosi called him by that strange title. His sister called him brother and the northerners had their names, too. 

Only she called him Rick. 

 

**DONAL**

He didn't speak his true name to anyone and chose a new one as soon as he arrived, though he knew it wouldn't do that much good. Anyone looking for him wouldn't be asking for "Sandor" or "Donal", which might narrow it down to a few score Westerosi exiles in the city. No, they would be asking for "the seven-foot-tall sod with half his face burned off". That would result in a list of precisely _one_.

But still, he shed it. Sandor was his name in Westeros, and he would never go back there. He'd left everything else behind, after all.

_Every **one** , too._

The big man groaned as he finished washing his ragged face. He'd woken that morning and looked around for the rotting goat under his bed, only to discover it was, in fact, _him_. He was amazed his neighbors hadn't called the city guards to report a fresh corpse in his lodgings. So that morning he'd decided to scrub up properly, a full wash... after his first skin of wine. Or two.

He stank of wine regardless, and he knew it, but sellswords weren't well-known for their cleanliness. Besides, it stopped him thinking, and he was better off half-drunk and busying himself that utterly sozzled and reliving the past, or sober and brooding on it. Sandor had crouched over his armor and cleaned it, link my link, slab by slab of plate. Extra cloth had been paid for, even some scrubbing brushes.

He wished he could have brought his helm, but like the one before it, people knew it too well. Sandor pursed his lips and sent out a silent, stupid apology to the boy.

Then he'd turned his attention to his body, stripping down to nothing in his sparse room above what he assumed was some sort of peculiar dressmakers-cum-bordello. It explained the full-length mirror in his room. He dropped his breeches and studied himself, seeking any distraction from his thoughts. The window was flung open and impossibly bright light filled the room, so different from the cloudy skies of the North.

_Age is starting to make a difference to you, old man._

Sandor was forty years walking the world, and he looked it. Not just his face, either, though the horrific, daemonic burns bespoke more of cruelty than years. He remembered when his stomach had been ribbed as a washboard and he didn't need to suck anything in. Where had those days gone? Oh, it was far from a gut, but the lines were vague and pushing out and his chest... still broad. Still strong and firm... but the black hairs and withered to grey in places, before their time. He supposed his physique was still impressive, but the history smote upon it...

His elbow ached when it was cold, which was all the fucking time, memories of that big ugly lizard cunt surfacing where it had nearly taken his arm off. His hand twinged now and then, remembering Hosteen Frey. His limp was growing a fraction more pronounced every year, and Sandor knew enough fractions made up a whole cripple. It wasn't just that fucker who'd stuck him in the Inn at the Crossroads, either. An arrow. A fine shot, one that took him down...

A boy screaming. Something that could have been mistaken for a man leering.

More red and white lines on his chest than he wanted to remember. Sandor stared at them for a long time, until the sodden scrub in his hand had gone almost dry. He traced one in particular... then another, high on his chest. 

_That one had come close._

But all of them were mere hors d'oeuvres compared to the nine-course banquet that was his face. Had that really changed so much? Not really, as far as he could tell. There was no skin to wrinkle, no muscle to sag... just a sickeningly slick wasteland of raw muscle and black-roasted fat and the white sheen of his jawbone jutting from the bottom of it all. There was no ear there: just a puckered hole that had oozed when he was younger, but at least he could hear from it. One corner of his mouth twisted and curled, like the press of his lips was a quill mark held steady until the very end.

Sandor stared at it all. What he was. What he'd always been, because that was all people saw and thus, bit by bit, he'd become his scars, and his hate, and his agony.

His hand moved slowly. An old game. Stupid and childish, but he'd played it since that first time the bandages came off. More than thirty years later, he still played it,though he knew every time he did it left his guts stewing in bitterness.

He covered the ravaged and wasted side of his face, the side that had made strong men queasy and children scream in horror. He shifted his hand around, black hair dropped over his fingers, until there was no hint to the damage underneath it. He stared at the face in the mirror like it was a stranger. High cheekbones, but without the sharpness of his youth. A few years of decent eating and less wine as a food group certainly helped. A heavy brow, now more lined... a hooked nose and... actually, lips that were full, not pursed. 

Sandor was almost believe that some would call that face handsome.

 _This is what I could have been_ , he thought to himself, trying to match the face to his body and failing. _Without Gregor. Would I have been like him, without what he'd done? Been another shit-eating knight who took noble vows and murdered and raped and "foraged" anyway?_

_Would I have been a man she could have loved? Even if I were handsome?_

He knew the answer. He'd seen the proof. His life had taken strange roads, through dark and light. But for all his brutality and the monstrosity his visage had been, she still loved him. But could she have without his scars? Such a demented question, wondering if a woman could love a _handsome_ man, but Sandor had no other words for it. The roads not taken were places he often wondered of, but could form no image. Too many... what did the maester call it... variables? Things that could have been but were not, and all of them important. Too many to count.

Sandor swallowed. He was seven when the bandages came off. The age when the gods were accepted with a shrug and a simple "because mama and papa say they are". How wonderful it was to be that age, where the whole world was black and white and nary a shade of grey. Then you realized just how horrible and unfair it could be. 

"Please," Sandor whispered to the mirror, the same words he always spoke when he played his foolish, cruel game. "Just once. Just for a moment."

He took his hand away...

... and Gregor's handiwork snarled back at him.

_Big fucking surprise, idiot._

He washed quickly and winced as he bent down to do the soles of his feet. Gods, that didn't feel good. He'd be pissing five times a night like an old man next. He dressed and turned his mind to the day, and the activity unfolding with frantic commercial intensity outside the window. Sandor peeked out and saw the street peddlers and merchants and laborers jostling with each other, the occasional bravo swaggering through the throng unmolested, smallfolk ( _is that even what they call them here?_ ) parting for them like fish before sharks. 

Sandor sneered, and with his bad side. Bravos. With their stupid little swords and foppy little fucking hats. Fuck them all. Give him full plate and his Western blade any sodding day. He forewent his cloak before deciding to leave. The air was already sticky and he didn't want the extra layer... in fact, he took of his plate, too. The chainmail he wore could stop one of those silly thin little swords.

He knew _that_ from bloody experience.

He fixed his mind on the toping house a few minutes away from his lodgings. He'd seen fair-headed men with broadswords on their back entering there one night, their armor and bearing screaming "sellsword" to him. Well, that was what he was looking for, so it seemed as good a place as any to start. 

Sandor gripped the door handle and the red-and-grey-and-yellow carving caught his eye. Sitting next to his bed on the table, carefully placed almost like a shrine. He should throw the fucking thing away. It would remind him of nothing but things he couldn't have. But he'd sooner cut a hand off than treat that with such scorn. Sandor sighed and thought back and back, to the opposite of this cloying heat that always felt like flabby, wet hands, and every breath was a hot towel shoved down your throat.

Ice in the air. Freezing daggers in every breath. Snow drifts tall as a giant, wide rivers made into highways choked solid and gleaming. 

An army on the move; a day that begun with such frenzy and excitement, every hand to purpose and foot to destination, save for their own tent. 

A day still talked about in the North, when an expedition of great liberation first began to move, when Sandor thought would march to his last battle.

Ten years on and already sweating, Sandor smiled at the carving and shook his head sadly.

_Not the last. Not even close._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Meh, that was pretty rough. I enjoyed writing Rickon but I'm new to the Rickeen Experience. Hope it wasn't too sloppy.


	25. Chapter 25

**WYLIS**

"This... It must be some kind of _joke_."

"Lord Wylis, I am known for many things, but my ribald sense of humor is most assuredly _not_ one of them. Nor, I would think, is Maester Aemon."

The fat lord shook his head yet again, so often that he was sure it would fall off at some point, and held out his hand. "Let me read it again."

The yellowed parchment made its rounds for the twentieth time, at least. It had been folded and unfolded so often that the creases were gouged deep and threatened to tear it into pieces, so every man treated it with care. No, more than that, Wylis saw as they passed it around and read it again and... he saw wide-eyed fear, like that of a child, spring stark and loud into their eyes. The nightmares of their septas and fathers, all howling in their minds.

He liked to think he was different, but he doubted it. A maester of impeccable reputation and ability, who had served a slew of Lord Commanders with loyalty and shrewdness, one who was far too old to sprout heirs or care about power that would only last a handful of years... that was a man whose word you did not doubt. Now such a man had blanketed the houses of Westeros with ravens, all marked with the same, impossible warning.

_Night gathers beyond the Wall. The first enemy, the daemons of ice and snow, have begun their march from the Land Of Always Winter. The wildlings have been driven south, tens of thousands of them, heading for the Wall. Already rangers have died fighting the walking corpses the Others can animate. The realms of men will soon be imperiled by Winter, by snow, and by ice with will and evil intent._

_Send aid. All of you. Before our barriers break for good and there is nothing to stop them._

Wylis read it again, and supped some wine... then bugger it, he finished the cup and refilled it. It seemed that only with a healthy layer of inebriation could he get his mind around this... development. Stannis sat at the head of the table in the long house, his Stormland and Northern lords and mountain chiefs and a handful of sellsword captains around him. Wylis, Sansa, Jonelle and their own were arrayed across the opposite side, and all of them were as ashen children compared to the stern visage of the King and his outcast court.

"The ancient enemy," Stannis intoned, though his words always seemed as serious as a septon's sermon. "The only enemy that matters. I have been chosen to vanquish this threat, a threat that will pour over and around the Wall, then engulf the rest of the kingdoms."

"Chosen, Your Grace?"

"By R'hllor, the Lord of Light, God of Flame and Shadow."

Ah. That didn't go over _quite_ as well. The Stormlanders nodded solemnly, faces stony but eyes twitching with a fanaticism that made Wylis nervous. The mountain clans kept their faces neutral, so carefully that Wylis knew they were trying very hard to be polite and not express their contempt. His own people exchanged glances and throat-clearings and Stannis did not seem to notice, or even care.

"He has chosen me. The Lady Melisandre, a red priestess, has aided me greatly in my campaign. It was she who convinced me that affairs in the North were far more important than squabbling over the Iron Throne." 

If he'd stopped there, Wylis would have thought very differently about Stannis Baratheon. But the man was nothing if not painfully, ruinously truthful, and added a moment later-

"For _now_ , at least. I _will_ claim my birthright, as the eldest brother of a king with no trueborn sons, but not before this plague of white death has been defeated."

Wylis wet his lips and tried to file this fresh intelligence away into some neat category of his mind, and... failed. His father had taught him much of scheming, of rolling with the endless tides and squalls that men's machinations could devise. Everything, almost, could be accounted for and planned around. But these were not the affairs of men, or even beasts. This was... something far beyond.

"And how," he finally managed to say, croaking out the words before clearing his throat. "Do we defeat such an enemy?"

King Stannis turned to him with eyes that could have leveled a forest. Iron eyes, as his father would say. 

"Not without much pain and death, Lord Wylis. But it is possible, and it will start in the North, the first kingdom they will ravage."

Across from him, Lady Stark stiffened in her seat and lowered her has as if in prayer. Standing behind her, Sandor Clegane shot Stannis a hidden look behind his curtain of hair, as if the man had intended to wound his charge. Wylis grimaced but did not comment. Stannis never hid or softened his words. He'd sooner cut out his tongue than find some more tactful way to speak, even if the news was "the house and people you have tried so hard to regain are about to be wiped out".

"Your pardon, Your Grace," Lady Jonelle said, leaning forward a touch and brushing her hand against Sansa's, "But would you care to provide some specifics?"

"I was _coming_ to that, Lady Jonelle."

"Oh, _good_."

His eyes narrowed just a fraction. Jonelle crunched a nut between the butt of her dagger and the table, then popped it into her mouth without looking away. Mors Crowfood guffawed and played it off as if he were choking, wiping his beard of nonexistent crumbs.

"As I was _saying_... it will not be easy, and it begins with the North united, as all the kingdoms must be. Roose Bolton and his Bastard have doubtless received the same message from the Night's Watch, and they have done _nothing_ , save scramble to marry the first Stark they can find and raise swords against their rightful king."

The table bristled for a moment, a wind of bubbling resentment and sullen agreement rushing over and through every man present. Wylis could see the mountain clansmen roll their eyes at the "rightful king" comment. The Florents and other Stormlanders sat high like preening peacocks, and Wylis thought how nice it must be to feel on the winning side, even when you were in a smallfolk hall with bad goat on your plate and ice on the rafters. The northern lords bore faces like mountain peaks. They followed Stannis for one reason: revenge. 

Wylis regarded the King of the Seven Kingdom and held his tongue at the first words that came to mind.

_Which is precisely what you have done, or would do, were you not already married, and there were not five hundred loyal men around Lady Stark to prevent you marrying her off to a useful lord. You pursue your "rights", southron, and they pursue theirs, as they see them._

"Should we not reinforce the Wall, as soon as Winterfell is retaken?" Lady Stark spoke up, and once again Wylis found his appreciation of the woman shine a little brighter. Not a girl; a woman. Moments after being told a tide of monsters would sweep over her land, she was thinking of its defence. "That is surely the first place they will strike, and Jon-"

"My Lady, do you believe this?" Ser Kamber all but growled across the table, scorn dripping from his lips like pus. "Others? Wights? Supported by grumpkins on the back of sodding _unicorns_ , I bet, and with _trolls_ in reserve-"

"You _dare_ to call me a liar, Ser?"

Kamber's muscled were tense, legs bent under the table, ready to jump up, and a dozen hands slid closer to swords and Wylis held a breath. 

"This letter is the ravings of a man too long in the snow and at the end of his wits. I do not-"

"Your Grace?" Lady Stark's voice did not shout or shriek, but something in it commanded the king's attention and Kamber's silence. "What does Jon say about this?"

"You mean Lord Eddard's bastard?"

Sansa's eyes went hard and the softness of her cheeks seemed to suck in and vanish.

"I mean the _Lord Commander_ , my _brother_. You defeated the wildlings when they attacked, or so I heard. You must have spoken to him."

"Yes, I did." His eyes moved between her and Kamber, the latter beginning to deflate like a balloon fit to burst, gratefully sprung a leak. "He told me of the wight he had killed, who was his dead brother the night before, then walked with unholy strength to try and kill Mormont. I spoke with Samwell Tarly, who claimed to have killed one of the Others, not just their proxies of dead flesh, with a dragonglass dagger. I spoke to wildling chieftains and commanders, and every one of them-"

"Bloody savages," Mors rumbled like a distant rockfall, eyes dark and glowering. "Can't trust any of the cunts-"

"But _all_ have the _same story_ , Lord Umber," Stannis broke in smoothly, foul words or not. "You can't get the wildling clans to agree on the color of horse droppings, but all of them agreed that the Others are coming, driving a vast horde of undead before them, and they bring a Winter beyond imagining and death to all. They could not stop this spread from north of the Wall, and sought to flee through it. Maester Aemon, his young apprentice Tarly, Lord Commander Snow... all of them concur and agree. Don't think I enjoy having to let thousands of wildlings loose in my kingdom, Lord Umber. But don't think I would turn down valuable news simply because of the source, either..."

Crowfood and Kamber exchanged looks, so similar for two so different. The shaggy, giant-descended lord and the clean-shaven, liveried knight. But a nod was exchanged, and Kamber settled back into his seat, pouring himself a generous portion of wine that could strip the color from bark.

"Indeed," he said, tipping back a heavy swallow. "Please, Your Grace...?"

Stannis nodded curtly and turned back to Sansa.

"The Wall will only hold them, Lady Stark, it will not stop them. And even if it could, the seas and rivers and bays to its sides will freeze solid in a few more months, if not already, and the Others and their minions will stroll around the Wall with ease. Marching an entire army to the wall would carry the risk of them being encircled. No, I believe it best to withdraw and form a new line of defence, possibly from the Wolfswood, above Winterfell and to the Narrow Sea." 

He sighed and in that one, tired sound, Wylis could see the train that the king never let anyone see. Trying to gain a crown was hard enough, but Stannis was a man who truly believed that destiny (or a burning god) had decided that he, a single man, would stand against the nightmare ghouls that had once came so close to obliterating all of Westeros. And, gods and fates being what they are, they hadn't even provided an army or decent spies to aid him. Just words. Now Stannis had to make good on them, looking down at the map of the North spread on the table, head hunched into his shoulders, weight of gods and kingdoms and monsters bearing down on him.

"Winterfell must come first," Wylis said, rising to his feet and pointing at the North's begotten capital. "As you say: unity. With the Boltons gone, all other Northern houses will pledge support to Lady Stark, and she for your claim. The civil strife will end, and we can begin our defences."

"And the Iron Throne?" Sandor's voice was almost more savage that Mors', even if he did ostensibly come from the "civilized" Westerlands. He fixed Stannis with a look somewhere between a stare and a glare, more curious than angry, but unable to keep some heat from his eyes. " The rest of the kingdoms? You think the Lannisters and the Tyrells will just nod their heads and follow your lead and the Lord of Bloody Light?"

Stannis, on the other hand, _did_ glare. "Pain and death, Clegane. As I said before. I _will_ pursue my claims, and spread the word of what comes from beyond the Wall, but _here_ is where the first battle must be fought. The North united can raise forty thousand men, given time and proper communications-" A hubbub of voices answered him, lord after chief after ser seeking to correct and decry, but his rising voice cut them off "- _and that is what we need to gain_. A true army. A force capable of holding back the Others when they arrive, on more than one front, if necessary. When that is done and the North is secure, I will go south."

He turned his eyes to Lady Stark, eyes smiling coldly even if his lips were incapable of the gesture.

"You knew some of my thoughts, Lady Stark, but not all. I seek not just what is _mine_ , as you do. I seek the defence of _all_. There's no point in bleeding for a throne only to rule over naught but ice and corpses once you sit upon it." 

Wylis couldn't disagree with that, but... he had to shrink his vision to something more manageable. Focused on the North, as outlined in rough ink and ornate scrawl upon the map. He pouted his lips thoughtfully and tapped Winterfell again.

"We get this back first, lay low our enemies of flesh and blood, before we think of ice and snow. Gods know that we cannot wage war on all Westeros from this bloody village..."

A rumble of agreement answered him, but not from Stannis. His eyes were suddenly even colder, darker... accusing. 

"There is one more pressing issue before we move on," he said, straightening up with his hand on his sword hilt. Wylis' eyes widened a touch and as they did, his own sworn men shifted in their seats. "I sent an emissary to White Harbor, to press my rights with your lord father. He never returned to me... and now I hear rumor that he was executed. This man, who was a loyal and devoted servant to me... and you killed him."

Now the ice isn't just on the rafters. Wylis can feel it drip into the veins of everyone at the table, no more so than Stannis. He would not have thought the man capable of such affection for one not his own blood, but now he can see a blue burning in his eyes. More than just his duty, and it seeks justice beyond rights of law.

"The smuggler... Davos?"

"Saeaworth. Yes. Him."

Lord Wylis' face doesn't crumble or sweat like he thinks Stannis expects. Mayhap he believed the farce his father created: a condemned thief made insensible, his hand mutilated and then beheaded, in the place of Seaworth, who was sent further north to find Rickon Stark. It was meant to fool Cersei Lannister but if it deceived others, well, all the better. 

_Never thought **that** would bite us in the sack._

"It was not so, Your Grace." His eyes flickered to Sansa and Stannis followed them. "His death was a deception. He was recruited by my father to... do a duty. For that duty, we would pledge to you, and bend the knee. But plans change."

"What duty, Lord Wylis?"

Voice so low it was below a snarl; a whisper that shook like his temper, tightly bound. A chair scraped, almost apologetically, and the two men turned to see Sansa Stark, ever the peacemaker, on her feet and looking her king in the eye.

"Rescuing my brother, Your Grace."

 

**SANSA**

Her future was daunting, and that was putting it mildly. She faced the most powerful house in the North, one so savage a _flayed man_ was their sigil, supported by the southron house she knew from bitter experience had long-since perfected cunning and patient, inevitable punishment. Even if Winterfell was taken without her allies decimated, her tasks would be far from over. Her brother, still lost... Stannis, still relentless in his pursuit of a crown... Winter fast-approaching, beyond shelter or negotiation... so much to face and surmount.

Now Sansa felt as if all her problems had been just the end of a spyglass peering on the horizon. Then Stannis had spoken, produced that impossible letter, the true reality of what Westeros faced... and someone had yanked the spyglass from her hand, shown her the true breadth of her hardships.

 _Not just yours_ , she reminded herself. _All of us. From the Wall to Dorne._

She forced herself to listen as the lords and sers were won over, inch by inch, but behind Stannis' and Wylis' voices she heard the rasping creak of Old Nan and her silly stories. The blue-eyed giant and the snickering snark of the Dreadfort. The men of ice and shadow with their shambling horrors and great spiders they used like hounds. The storms that froze men and kings and killed birds even as they flew, but the Others strode through it all like the merest drizzle. The Night's Watch. The Last Hero. A tide of darkness and hate for life surrounding the waning candle of Man, but they had triumphed. They had beat back the Winter.

 _But we are not heroes_ , a voice said in her head, trembling with truth and doubt both. _We're... just us. We can't even decide on a king._

Then she heard "Bolton", and "North" and "Stark" from Stannis. The words seemed to drag her from the shadows in her own skull. She flicked a glance behind her and Sandor was there, towering and still and vigilant. They locked eyes for just a moment and the corners of his mouth twitched slightly. The grey armor of his eyes was shed and half-covered by his hair, the eye on his bad side winked, snake-tongue fast.

Three days in freezing tents. Three nights shivering against each other.

Sansa lowered her head again, but this time to hold her blush, not her fear.

Three mornings waking in his arms, and rousing him in turn with her lips. Three afternoons of slow riding when they had talked, just _talked_ , as the snow whirled and the wind howled.

Days with his eyes on her and no shred of the anguish she'd seen and caused at Castle Cerwyn. Sansa knew how wretched guilt and shame could make one feel; now she knew how forgiveness could blast away all the soul's change and make it fly.

Like a bird.

"Should we not reinforce the Wall, as soon as Winterfell is retaken?" 

She was Lady Sansa Stark of Winterfell, and she would not be a silent, fearful outline at this table. She had questions and concerns and damned if she wasn't going to give them a voice. So she spoke and questioned, rose and made peace, then Wylis was struck by Stannis' last inquiry... and it was she who answered him. Dour and cold and unrelenting as he was, he would help her. His men would die for her ends, and the more she listened to his subdued pomposity... she saw more to him than that.

_He truly believes he is doing the right thing. The Lannisters, the Tyrells, the Ironborn, the Dornish and the Boltons and the Dragon Queen far away... none of them know or care about what's coming from beyond the Wall. Only him. And he's willing to stand against it by himself if he has to._

"I owe you the truth, Your Grace," she said, voice the steady timbre of her mother. "Lord Wyman ensured Ser Davos' death was a falsehood, so he could be sent to return Rickon, my youngest brother, from hiding in Skagos. I arrived and took shelter with Lord Wylis not long after he departed but... after..."

That hand. WIthout a note or a message, and not needing it. The hollow look of the messenger, eyes empty after terror had gouged out all feeling, had told them all the Bastard of Bolton had Davos, and her brother. She felt her voice freeze and choke in her throat. Her stomach curdled like rotten milk and in-between her blinks she sees-

Rickon-

Laughing-

Screaming-

Bleeding-

Flayed-

_No._

The voice was loud and it was hers and Sandor's together. She would _not_ do this; she would _fucking **not**_. She could not save Rickon, not from here. Only action, forward motion, their house restored and ascendent once again, would give them the means and the power to get him back. She dug her fingernails into her palms until they bit past skin and drew blood but she still answered. 

"The Boltons captured them both, when they were sailing back to White Harbor. Your Grace, I am sorry... the Bastard of Bolton sent us his hand back. The one missing fingers."

Nothing on Stannis moved save for his throat, the ball there rocketing up and them plummeting, just once. Other than that he was a stone figure, but that simple reaction told Sansa much. Then his jaw clenched so hard his cheekbones pressed out against his cheeks and he ground out: "Does he live?"

"We don't know, Your Grace. I hope so. Wylis spoke highly of him. Bolton may be keeping them both alive, if only to... to question Davos."

She looked away that time. She didn't want to see the grim understanding in his eyes. Whatever Davos was to Stannis, the stony king cared about him, and she did not wish to cause him more pain. But his voice was still steady when he spoke again, if quieter.

"I understand..."

The sentence trailed off, and that alone was strange, Sansa could see. Every word and statement from Stannis rang with finality, a command of authority he believed with all his soul he had earned. He never doubted, never feared. She had heard that he'd led the vanguard personally when he assaulted King's Landing, showing his quality when Joffrey had hid behind his mother and his walls. But when the words seemed to fall over some cliff, without any anchor for the next... she saw a flare of grief in his eyes, of anger, of guilt.

"Your Grace?" His eyes snapped to hers and she held the stare. "They have my brother, too. If we take Winterfell, the Boltons will lose their grip on the North. Their allies will vanish, and they will be alone, without any means to escape. They will _have_ to return them, or they know we will exterminate them _all_." 

Ferocity seeped into her voice until the last words was almost snapped, not spoken. A few of the lords and sers blinked in surprise. One of the sellsword captains chuckled wryly into his cup; Lord Florent looked positively scandalized and Sansa fought not to roll her eyes. Twas all well and good when a man got his blood up, but when a _woman_ spoke of vengeance?  

Stannis just nodded. He knew wisdom when he heard it.

"In that we are of like mind, Lady Stark. But Winterfell is fortified beyond tell and garrisoned by thousands, as you well know..." He sat back down and Sansa did the same. She could feel the brittle, purring tension leak from the air between Wylis and his new king, and the conversation slid from battling daemons to the relatively more commonplace question of how to storm a castle. "... and the only advantage we have is that their provisions are running low."

"Not the only one."

"Ah, you refer again to your presence?" Stannis still couldn't keep the whisper of mockery from his voice. Sansa bristled but did not find it in herself to snap back at him. She knew how unlikely it sounded. Much depended on things without form nor easy understanding. Loyalty. Courage. Honor. Fine words to speak; hard acts to forge. "Forgive me, Lady Stark, but I fear that will not be enough."

Sansa nodded. "It may not be. Strained as Bolton's loyalties are, even if there is rebellion and infighting caused by my presence, it may not be enough to open the gates. But that is not the _only_ part of the plan, Your Grace."

She twisted and nodded at Sandor Clegane. He nodded back and vanished out the nearest door without a word, having to duck down below the beam above him. Sansa swallowed and hid the nervous movement. To those watching, befuddled but expectant, mayhap it seemed smooth and practiced... but Sansa truly did not know what would follow when Sandor walked back in.

He told her he had a plan. But the details, the substance, he'd kept that from her, and that nagged and festered within her. Wylis caught her eye and she nodded, trying to look more confident that she felt. A moment later the door opened and his vast, black-clad form eclipsed the snow and darkness, then moved away to reveal a smaller figure, with wide eyes and, when he beheld his captive audience, a much smaller voice that mayhap only she could hear.

"Oh, fuck me _running_ ," said Niall.  

 

**NIALL**

Gods, boys, I was sure my guts would spring out my arse at the sight of 'em all.

Imagine it! Me! A fisherman's son, born behind the dye works in White Harbor, without a drop of noble blood, and I looked around that table... and there was not a man staring at me less than a ser or a lord. King Stannis was there! Face like carved stone, eyes burning, burning like his god of fire, staring through me, burning a hole, right... here!

Oh, _come_ now, Ely. I know Jon hears worse from Aykob when he trains in the morning. Well, no, of course I don't! Boy has to hear it at some-

Fine. Fine, woman, I will... she always wins, boys. Lesson, there: don't argue with a woman, or don't start one. Try to make sure that you've won before you even speak, or make her think it's her own-

Nothing, Ely! Anyway, where was I? Hmm? Oh, yes... 

So Sandor Clegane walks me in and... Malus, no, I told you _that_ story last night! No, _that_ one was the night before! I'm telling _this one_ now, and Jon wants to hear it, don't you, Jon? See? Now hush, or no stories tomorrow night.

So, he brought me in and the hall was silent. Cold, too. Deep, angry Winter that year, boys, but considering what was coming with it, shouldn't have been so surprising. I was covered so much in furs I looked like a bear with a skin sickness, but Sandor told me to wait close by and then he fetched me, bold as brass and heaving through the bloody snow. Hardly ever saw him wear a cloak, now I think of it. 

He brings me in and Lady Sansa... well, I know she's a Queen _now_ , Jon, but back then she was a _Lady_ , now do you want to hear this or not? No, I didn't ask you, Malus! Hush, boy, don't make me say it again...

Lady Sansa was looking at me, and King Stannis, Lord Wylis, Lady Jonelle - oh, tell your mother to stop rolling her eyes - and everyone was waiting for me to speak, I knew it. But Sandor spoke first, of course. And, typical of the bloody man, he left sod-all out.

"Young man here's a smuggler, in White Harbor-"

"We-Well, sers, that's _one way_ to, ah-"

"Quiet, lad. Aye, he's a criminal, but he's a smart one, and he's done good by us. But more than that, he knows things about Winterfell. He knows ways in and out that most don't..." He turned and looked at me - and _down_ at me - and I understood all those questions he'd asked me when we sparred and rode and trained. "Isn't that right, boy?"

"Y-Yes, Clegane," I said, voice all shaky like I was still outside, but at least I didn't call him "Ser".

"And you would trust a smuggler for such an important task?"

Sandor went all puffed up at Stannis and said: "As much as _you_ would trust one to press your bloody rights in the North, Your Grace." Well, that shut him up good an' proper, I can tell you. But Lady Sansa was still looking at me, and there was something sharp in her eyes. Your old Dad smugglin' was one thing, but into _her_ castle, where _her_ house was? Oh, I could tell she didn't like that...

"And how," she said, voice too polite, like your mother when she's looking for a moment to pounce on me. "Did you get into the castle with your... wares?"

I stood there with my feet shuffling in one spot and my hands wrestling with themselves and I didn't want to speak, boys. Didn't want to tell them everything, especially not Lady Stark. She was such a sweet lady. She still is, but you'd not know it. She has to be a Queen, all the time, and queens have to think for the good of everyone, except themselves. I'll tell you what that means when you're older. Anyway, I swallowed and didn't look her in the eye when I spoke. Even Stannis was a better target for my eyes than her.

"There... There was a cave, just... it was past the walls and under moat, outside... ah..."

Gods, I can't tell you what it felt like, boys. Having all those eyes staring at me, unto me, making me feel small. But Sandor put his hand on my shoulder and squeezed it, just once, gentle for him but it felt like a bear pawing me. I knew he'd take care of me, even after he gave me a black eye and a bloody lip. Oh, I don't remember why, lad. Probably just didn't move fast enough when we were sparring.

"A cave?" Stannis said, jumping all over me like a dog. "Leading to where?"

That was the hard part, lads. I looked at Lady Sansa and I asked her forgiveness. I never thought I'd have to tell a highborn, let alone a Stark, about how I snuck hooch and smoke into Winterfell. I didn't think it was bad back when I was doing it; just the safest way to do what I had to, make sure your aunties had food through the Winter. I even thought it was so clever, so sneaky.

I didn't feel that when I looked at Lady Stark. I owed her a look in the eye, at least.

"Into... Into the crypt, King Stannis. Lady Stark, I'm sorry, I..." My hands flailed around like this as I looked for the words, like I could grab them out of the air like butterflies, but I could tell she didn't want to hear them. She turned away from me and I looked to Stannis instead. "... anyway... that's... where it comes out."

Stannis frowned and I could see he wasn't convinced. Can't say I blamed him. "You mean to tell me there is a _tunnel_ going straight from the crypt, all the way under the moat and coming out-"

"Well, not... not a _tunnel_ , King Stannis-"

"Yer Grace."

"Sorry?"

Sandor mumbled down at me from the side. "Your Grace. That's what y'call him him. Not King Stannis."

"But he _is_ a King, right?"

"Yeah, but you call him Your Grace."

"Sounds bloody stupid."

"It is, but-"

Well, we weren't going to whitter on like that all bloody night. Stannis rapped his knuckles on the table and glared. "When you are _quite_ finished, gentlemen?"

Sandor snorted at that last part. I just gulped and kept talking, trying not to look at Lady Sansa's red hair, the way it seemed to stutter and shimmer with the anger she was holding back. 

"It's, ah... It runs kind of... flush, next to the crypts. There's gaps in the walls, behind... some of the tombs, like. Wide enough to get yer arm through, pass things through-"

"Could you break it down?" Stannis liked the sound of this, I could tell, and he ignored Lady Sansa when she looked at him all horry-eyed. "Is the stone too hard?"

"Aye... I-I suppose you could. Use... picks, or something."

"Wouldn't that make quite the noise?"

"Don't think anyone would hear it, m'lord. Took J... ah, took the man I met down there ten minutes to walk from the door downward. Unless there's men already down there... no, they won't hear anything."

You wouldn't believe how deep and dark those tunnels are, lads. Way down low in the earth, like big worms were wriggling through them and just kept going and going. And the crypts are even deeper, they say. All those Starks, thousands and thousands of years, laid down in their stone beds, carvings over their heads, sleeping forever a league underneath the dirt and sky, they say. I'll take you there one day, if you're not too _scaredy!_

Alright, alright, enough rough stuff, lads! Back to your beds... 

Well, that got the lords nattering, didn't it? Completely forgot about your old dad, started pointing at the map and pulling it around, talking and chattering and all the while, I couldn't stop looking at Lady Sansa. I'd hurt her, boys. Oh, yes, I did. You haven't got to use your hands or swords or sticks to hurt someone. You can do it with words, and sometimes that's worst of all. I stared and stared until she turned, just a little... but she didn't look at me.

Those were her _family_ , down there in the cold dark. She and her parents and her brothers and sister... they'd gone down there to pay respects, because it was a safe and sacred place. Now I told her it was where bloody smugglers buggered around with cheese and ham not taxed, and silly smokes and herbs from the back end of-

"Quiet!" Stannis' voice was like a roaring bull and they did as they were told, sharpish. "This could be what we need! If we could move men into that tunnel, get into the crypt, and have them move with speed and purpose... so close to the north gate-"

"Then we could take the gatehouse and get them fucking open," Sandor finished for him, smiling that Stannis had guessed his plan from-

Ow! Ely, it's what he _said_! I did not _curse_ , not _really_ , I was quoting-

Ow! Fine, fine... dunno _why_ , though, they hear worse from the man himself when-

ah-HA! Not so fast the third time, are w-

Awwwww... _kff_... another lesson... lads... never underestimate... yer mother...

Anyway. Where was I? 

Stannis' eyes were glowing now, but not with that silly fire god. He was thinking sharp and quick now, imagining how he could get men so close and so deep into WInterfell. Sandor strode over to the table and placed a fat finger on the map without even needing to bend down that much.

"North gate is here... we could form up... on the north-east side... with Lord Wylis and his horsemen ready on our right flank. When we have the gatehouse, we lower the bridge, open the gate and they ride like f... um, damn... hells, to get through into the castle. Once we have the gate and the courtyard beyond it, we can pour the rest of the men in."

"How will they know when to make their move?" That was from Lord Wylis. Good man, I'll mark ye both. Not quite as strict as his father, I think, but he was always thinking like him. "What will their signal be?"

Sandor licked his lips but still nodded. He was liking all of it, I could tell. Gave him a chance to get it all out.

"When Lady Stark makes herself known to the walls, we'll be able to hear it. By that time, we'll be close to the door and-"

"We?" That came from Lady Stark. Part of me thought that it would. "You will go with them?"

"Someone has to go with the boy to-"

"Oh, now wait a _moment_ -"

"Shut up, boy. Like I say, someone has to. I'm best in the thick of things, you know that. Stick me in a hallway with a big bloody sword and I'll hold it until the cavalry charges in. But I won't be alone."

She wanted to say more. She swallowed and her lips squirmed but she couldn't say anything in front of the lords. Oh, why? Well, ah... because she had to... keep her mind only on the military stuff, you understand? You have to do that, when things are so important. So she nodded and looked down and Sandor looked sad, too, but he's a fighter, boys. That's what fighters are for.

"Wouldn't mind your clansmen coming with me," he said, nodding at Young Flint, who even ate with that big sodding sword propped up on the back of his chair. "Lads look like they know how to fight close and nasty. Few score of them in those narrow hallways, holding four or five doors... aye, they'd be enough. Get us enough time."

"But how would you get in the tunnels and up to the crypt in time?"

"Leave the night before," Sandor said, like it was obvious. "Boy'll show us the way in, then up to the crypt door, and we'll wait. Once we hear the commotion, we'll know it's time to move. Ser Kamber o'er there told us that patrols and men are hardly ever at the crypt. No need, far as they're concerned."

Stannis nodded to himself, and I could see he liked the sound of it... but he couldn't quite swallow it. Yet. 

"I have prisoners I could question, find out what men would be like to be on the gatehouses. Mayhap we'd get lucky and-"

"I doubt it," Sandor said, interrupting a bloody king again and I wanted to take a step away from him. Thought the gods struck you if you did that kind of thing. "Bolton's not a f...lippin' idiot. He wouldn't have men he didn't trust with their hands on the doors to his castle. Nah, it'll be Dreadfort men, every gate, I'd wager. Surprise is what we're gunna rely on. The fighting will be a benefit for us, keep Bolton's men busy and split; but Lady Sansa showing up? _That_ will be what signals us, down below, and keeps every eye distracted."

Everyone in the hall was muttering then, to each other and themselves, trying to roll this around. I was swallowing so hard and so often I thought I'd bloody drown on spit. Shoulda' bloody _figured_ Sandor would try this on me. I thought he pulled me on that march because he saw a knight in me, and... well, maybe he did, but there was something more. The stuff I knew, that's what he wanted.

Funny, though. I never thought anyone would see that in me. 

"Tis a bold scheme," Stannis said, standing back up and raising his voice so everyone would shut up. "And carries much risk... but I think it can work, Clegane. I'm not for disturbing the Starks of old, but this plan will see their house and their rest liberated, so we shall use it. Lord Flint, three score of you best fighters, have them picked for when we arrive at Winterfell. Sandor, stick close to Flint, you and... your name, boy?"

"N-Niall, King... Your Grace."

"Better. You'll be well-rewarded for this by Lady Stark, I am sure."

I gulped, and hard. Rewarded. I knew what Stannis meant by that; I'd heard how he "rewarded" the last smuggler in his employ. Take the good an' the bad, though, and buggery, s'not like _he_ was the one that took my eye, was it?

After that it was all pretty boring. Lords and sers asking questions about men and formations and rations and all that stuff. Sandor led me back outside into the cold and I barely felt it. I was still wringing sweat out from my armpits and shivering, but not from the weather. Sandor patted me on the shoulder and gave me that stern, approving look I know he uses with you boys.

"Did well, lad. Very well."

"Think we can pull it through?"

"Wouldn't have bloody said so if I didn't."

"Lady Sansa hates me," I said, and he was the only one I could speak so bluntly with. Really, he was the only one I knew apart from Wylis, and he was always bloody distant when I did see him, back at White Harbor and... well, you're too young to understand, but when Lady Sansa wanted, you'd completely forget she was highborn. She was just a sweet girl who'd seen so many bad things and they'd not left any stain on her. Scars plenty, aye... but no stains. "She's going to chop my bloody fingers off!"

"Aye, she might," he said, the bastard, grinning when I turned the color of the snow. "But I doubt it."

"How d'you know?! She might-"

The door opened, and who was it? Lady Sansa herself, beautiful as the Maiden and looking all flustered coming from the sort-of-heat to the very-cold. 

"My... My Lady..."

"The night wanes, Sandor," she said, looking me over just once before sliding next to him, fitting close to his side like she was made to be there. "Do we have lodgings?"

"Hut over yonder," he said with a jerk of his head. "Checked it out. One bed, so I'll be on the floor."

Lady Sansa smiled sadly, but her eyes were... kind of laughing. 

"Lady Sansa?!" I spat out the words so fast they were almost begging, and before I knew it, I was down on one knee like I was preparing for a knighthood of a bloody marriage proposal. Lady Sansa's eyes widened and Sandor's rolled. "Please. Forgive me."

I was on my knee for a while, as she looked at me, studying me, deciding and thinking and things between those two. Long enough for me breeches to get soaked through. Happens faster than you'd think, even in the Winter. I knew she was a smart lady, not like a lot of highborns. They just _react_ to things, not _think_ , not really. They only know how to think one way. Not Lady Sansa. She looked at me for a long while and then the snow rustled as she crunched towards me... and I looked up... and she was smiling at me.

"I don't forgive you for smuggling. For using my family's bones to sell your wares."

Can't tell you how bad that hurt me. Felt like someone had stuck a hand in my guts and was pulling them out my belly button. I let my head drop and I was ashamed, and didn't want to be, but then-!

"But now I know you will risk so much for me. You will lead my sworn shield and other brave men under the castle, and fight with them against hard, cruel enemies. You will open the gates with them, and you will save my family." She touched her hand to my shoulder, and I rose. There is nothing like it, boys. To rise. "Niall the carter. Niall the smuggler. Niall the... blasphemer of my family's bones."

The smile wavered and then came back. There was no cold, no snow, no ice. Just the sun of her hair and the warmth of her lips.

"Niall the Savior of Winterfell. For all those things, I thank you... and my gratitude outweighs my grudge, by quite some measure. Good night, Naill..."

"Good night," said I, "Lady Stark..."

Alright! That's enough story for one night! Jon, take your boots off when you're in bed, for heaven's sake... Malus, stop twisting the head off that teddy bear! Ely, the baby can come in now... ah, my love... sleeping so beautifully... no, I can take her, dear. I know this has been a hard one for you-

What was that? Oh... yes, I'm sure he will. Of course. He's... He left, for somewhere far away, but he's coming back. Of course he is. What kind of... _ahem_ , kind of sworn shield would he be, if he didn't come back? But Queen Sansa... she gave him a special task, I think. One only he could do. So, when he does that, he can come back, and you'll see him again. How do I know? Because its your name day in a month, boy! When has he _ever_ missed one?! 

That's right. Now to bed, both of you, and don't wake your sister.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Found [this](http://gameofthrones.wikia.com/wiki/Military_forces_of_the_Seven_Kingdoms) this morning when researching the possible military outline for the Seven Kingdoms. Funnily enough, GRRM himself gave the RPG makers the figures, even if he did stress they were only to be a ROUGH guide. Still very useful!
> 
> Also, [here](http://awoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/Winterfell#Layout) is where I got the basis for my plottage about infiltrating/taking Winterfell back. All the Intel used to make the map is directly taken from the novels, nowhere else, so I thought it was pretty good. Don't worry, I'll be posting this in later chapters, if anyone needs it.
> 
> Sorry if this seemed a little plot heavy, but there was much I wanted to clarify and resolve. The climax of this Part (well, most of it) is fast approaching, and while I don't want to drag it out, I'm so eager to get my typing fingers wet with claret again... oh, and I hope you enjoyed the FP narrative change! S'ALL YOU, FOXY!


	26. Chapter 26

**SANDOR**

 

Closing the door on the world was fast becoming his favorite time of day, and _that_ was starting to worry him. There was too much warmth and contentment in whatever little privacy they carved out for themselves, when the sun had gone to the hells and there were no prying eyes to worry about. He poured himself into those moments, those nights, and even as he did, some part of him trembled and growled. 

Happiness was just a thing that could be taken in his world. Losing his own would be painful enough, but taking hers...?

"Sandor? Still awake, or sleeping upright...?"

He breathed in hard, and that suck and sniff from his nostrils seemed to break the spell. The inward look of his eyes reversed. His gaze drifted over her with the same intensity it flickered over everything else. Corners and stairs and doors, closets and curtains, every face that came within ten feet of her... all of them were scorched and marked by his grey gaze like bolts of iron lightning. But now they were alone, with the cold banished behind oak doors and by the flames cackling and shivering skyward in the hearth, they slowed... but did not abate. 

"Just admirin' the view."

She blushed and once upon a time, she would have dipped her head to hide it, the shy girl of King's Landing. No longer. Her cheeks flushed red for a moment before that heat, that light slid to her mouth and a knowing smirk lit her lips. She clasped her hand behind her back, straightening up almost like she was... presenting herself.

Sandor felt a growl rise from his hips to his belly, through his lungs and roll straight out of his throat like a shaved, upright direwolf. Little bird, now smart as a hawk, and knowing damn well what she did to him.

He took his time walking over to her, unbuckling and discarding segments of armor with blind, mindless practice. He didn't want to miss a moment of her, standing bold and flawless in the light of the fire. Silk smallclothes slid and clasped to her; she'd worked hard to keep hold of them in their long trip from The Vale. He'd tried to convince her to switch to linen instead, telling her it would be much warmer, but Sansa wanted the fine, insubstantial smoothness of silk, and could not be moved.

He still worried about keeping her warmth, but didn't say a damn thing about getting rid of the silk.

Linen and wool, no matter how fine, could not mold so well to her curves. The contours of her, a landscape that mesmerized him, from the slope of her shoulders to the indents of her stomach above her hips... full hips, and gods, didn't he just love that? Child-bearing hips, he'd heard them called, though he felt queasy when he thought about _his_ child coming out of them. Sculpted and full, a woman before him, not the waif he'd met years before.

He was down to his tunic and breeches when he placed his hands on them, sliding his palms from her sides, down the groove of her pelvis, to her hips... feeling the shudder of her when he got so low-

Her mouth parted, just a little. Breathless. Expectant. A mask of innocent inexperience but like all masks, once you reached the _eyes_... 

Hunger. Mayhap not even sure _what_ it yearned for, but they had plenty of time to work out her diet, and every time he saw it, it was only his face that conjured it.

He chased that thought away by ducking down his head she rose to meet him-

Blackberries. He couldn't place it for days after their first kiss. Now he would never forget it.

The fire snapped and the wind howled and the roof grumbled when clumps of snow built up and were tossed off by the careless wind. But Sandor cared for none of it. His whole world was his lips on hers, his hands roving up her body, around her, behind her, finding the swell of her breasts, now full and filling his hand. Her gasp, that tiny explosion of breath against his lips, was like a tornado against his restraint.

"Sansa..."

Saying her name... like that. With affection. With longing and devotion and disbelief. That final thing he couldn't give voice to, even after all they had endured and all they'd shared. And what she'd said. Days had passed since Castle Cerwyn and Sandor had fallen asleep one night staring at her still, slumbering form, wondering and fearing for her. At first he simply blocked it out. It was just... a turn of phrase. A word. Something she'd used in a sentence because she hadn't known any better. But her eyes said otherwise, wide and bleeding her feelings for him when they'd been slogging through the snow.

Wide with... _gratitude_ , that something mangled and hollow like _him_ would forgive _her_. Sandor had barely understood it, and then when he did, wished he didn't. Maybe he was right, and it was not what she said, but she still felt it and-

_And that is not the issue you keep fucking dancing around. Because you love her, too, and if you speak it-_

"Sandor?" His eyes fluttered open and her eyes were there, his whole world, pools of limpid, azure concern. "What's wrong?"

_Tell her. Speak the words, you coward._

Sandor shook his head and kissed her again, cupping her face and letting his arms slide down her swan-like neck, a carpet of soft silk and skin and gods he couldn't tell when one became the other. But he felt his hands slide under her nightshirt and he tugged... pulled it down...

His eyes opened. Hers already were. Much they had shared and done, but some things, some sights? There were barriers, mostly put up by him. But in light of the longhall, all that they knew was now bearing down on them, Sandor felt them strangely...

"Only if you wish."

"Wh..." She almost seemed frightened, wetting her lips with a flutter of her eyes and that was enough to give Sandor pause. But her words came back stronger afterwards. "Why tonight?"

"You know why."

"Because..." Her eyes shone, now with something else. Wet and worried. "San... Sandor, you _are_ going to come back-"

"I didn't say I wasn't," he said back, and his hands kept moving, daring her to stop him. The straps over her shoulders slid off them, and it was only the curve of her breasts and his own fingers keeping her chest covered. "I just wanted to."

A smile flickered across her face, and as her own nightshirt began to drop, she felt her slight, determined fingers fiddling with his breeches. 

"I heard once that, um..." Gods, even when she was nearly naked and he was twisted in knots with lust, she still made him grin when she blushed. "When a man feels The Stranger close, he is more... inclined to-"

"Fuck?"

"I was going to say 'make love'," she said, and then she stepped back, elbows drawn close to her sides, making her sides smooth and streamlined-

The nightshirt fluttered to the floor. Sandor's mouth opened and something was lodged in his throat. He cleared it noisily and Sansa bit her lips. Maiden, Mother... he didn't know which. He only knew she was divine and perfect, from the dark peaks of her nipples and the glide of her throat to her stomach with just the hint of a belly and her hips, shapely and full. 

"Still admiring?"

"Get back over here and I'll do more than admire."

"Ah-ah-ah," she said playfully, reaching out to grab the hem of his tunic and start pulling it up. "Not fair... just  _me_... being barechested."

And so a moment later he was, after a moment of blinding fabric before his eyes and he could have snarled at being robbed of the sight of her for even a moment... then forgave the universe in general when he saw the way her breasts bobbed and shook as her arms lowered again. The air seemed to smoke between them, only her undershirt and his own knee breeches between them. For a long moment he just stared... amazed that someone, something so beautiful could want his eyes on her, and then everything else.

Sandor went down to his knees, eyes never leaving her. Even down there he was still almost up to her shoulder, and dipped his head lower... closer... until the smell of her skin, sweat and heat and lingering soap and cloves... it was every and-

She gasped as he took a nipple between his lips. He growled as he felt it stiffen in his mouth, then shake as his tongue flicked at it. His short breeches were suddenly intolerable, what he had inside straining and pushing and gods she still wanted this. Her hands were in his hair, stroking his scalp and caressing long strands of his straight black mop. Sandor dared to roll that peak between his teeth and the sound that shuddered out of her mouth-

"S-Sando-r."

-was enough for him to wrap his arms around her waist and lift her high-

-then lose both his feet-

-as she screeched and they went flying-

_Boots. Forgot about the fucking boots._

The world went sideways and then ended in a soft crash on a bed of furs and her voice giggling madly in his ear. Her arms around his neck and his face on fire with embarrassment, curse words slithering out of his mouth and just making her laugh all the harder. He scowled, out of instinct, looming over her on his elbows, her body under his and...

Sansa was shaking her head and smiling and her teeth shone and the look in her eyes... it was deep and potent and it terrified him. More than Gregor. More than fire. 

Because it gave no time to his scars. It didn't see them, like it was blind to all the ugliness in him and on him and-

_No-one has ever looked at you like that._

As if to prove his thoughts, her hand came up and stroked her knuckles across his scars... then her fingertips, soft little pads of warmth that he could barely feel through the ruined flesh. That look... it never wavered. Just mirth and girlish enjoyment and Sandor felt the curses dry up and his face flush for very different reasons.

"Always one to take everything into account, aren't you?"

He didn't respond. He breathed and felt her nipples push through the hair covering his chest. It tickled and nipped at them and she bit her bottom lip, neck arching as she let the pleasure of it make her boneless, and without thought his head ducked down to suck at that spot on her neck, where he could feel the beat of her pulse and claim it, draw a gasp from her-

Just the hint of his teeth. The tremble of his growl echoing through her flesh, and his smirk when he felt goosebumps under his lips. 

"Sandor..."

She rolled her hips against him and by the fucking gods, those short breeches were about to tear at the seams. But he knew what would happen if they did, and that wasn't-

"Roll onto your back."

He shook the stars from his eyes, then looked up to see her own sparkling wickedly. 

"What?"

"On your back. I want to try something."

Sandor was suddenly guarded, and uncaring if he seemed wary of a girl half his age, half his size and about a third his strength. He knew his little bird well enough to see that pet name was no longer fitting. She was smart and savvy and when she got her mind set, she was as implacable in her way as Stannis. Sandor reared up over her and cocked his head to one side. She rolled her eyes, stretching her neck a moment to peck his lips. 

"You look like a pup being shown a magic trick when you do that."

"Bugger off."

"Oh, yes, I'm sure _that_ will happen."

He was about to shoot something back when she took advantage of him, the little minx. Hooked a leg around his hips and pressed her heel into his arse and just as he stiffened-

-managed with some effort worth of Duncan The Tall to roll them both over on the bed loaded and overloaded with furs, so she was straddling him...

Sandor didn't complain. He couldn't think of a sane man that _would_ , looking up and seeing Sansa Stark with hair mingling with the glare of the flames until it was all one undulating mass of fire, astride him with her hands warm and searching on his chest, breasts undone and heaving with every breath. Instead he just let his head roll back and tried to still the questions in his head, stroking in slow, languid lines up her thighs and asking one of his own.

"What're you playing at, little-"

 _Bird_ was strangled abruptly off was she rolled her hips against him and that soft wetness between her legs slid hard against his hardness and grounded lightning shot through him and paralyzed him and snapped through his hands-

"Ow!"

The wave passed, dried and vanished when he heard the pain in her voice... and saw the red, ugly handprints on her thighs where he'd squeezed hard. He looked up, panic suddenly clouding his eyes like clouds across the sky, going to sit up-

-but her hand was against his chest and before he could ask-

Her lips were on his. Reassuring with her tongue and her breath in his mouth in ways his tongue could not. Until she broke away and she whispered against him, one hand in his hair, the other sliding down his chest.

"It's fine... don't worry... just be gentle..."

"I'm sorry. Didn't expect that-"

"Well... you _are_ going to expect... _this_..."

In point of fact, he wasn't, but then he felt her fingers around him and every word in his skull vanished and Sandor sighed into a long, wet kiss and didn't give a fuck about questions anymore. But he _did_ mind where he put his big mitts.

 

**SANSA**

_Don't panic, don't panic, don't-_

_Sweetling, this **isn't** panic._

Sansa didn't know exactly how she knew that, but she was in no position to argue with herself. Or care to. She'd had enough hours of fantasizing about what Sandor would feel like under her, and now she had the chance to indulge it. And the funny part of it was, it was mostly his doing.  

They had settled into a tentative but definite routine, these last few nights. When his last rounds were complete and he shut the door on them both, bracing a chair before the handle for extra security (and privacy, as she well knew), the man who was still "The Hound" melted away. He shed him like the armor he wore, and when he held her, kissed her, ran his strong hands down her body... that was Sandor.

That was all she wanted. 

But something had spurred him past his usual boundaries, and Sansa did not want to dwell on what. As she'd waited and disrobed, tying to distract herself with such simple end-of-day routine, her mind was plagued by images of him disappearing into a dark cave and never returning alive. Found hewn and lifeless amidst a mountain of corpses. Oh, she knew he would acquit himself. Die like a fucking warrior, of course, but still _die_. Still leave her. He and Niall and three score of clansmen, at most, set against hundreds. Thousands. 

The thought tried to stab through her passion and she rode against it, pushed it away... and he was all around her again, a warm world of muscle and protection. She felt that queer rush of power when she shed her slip, not thinking about how this was the first time he had seen her, _really_ seen her so bare, but knowing that look... that desire and adoration in his eyes. 

Nothing would embolden a maiden more... and then it was washed away when she did likewise with him, and that door-broad slab of sculpted muscle he called a chest was inches from her. Scars and burns and the ravages of years of war. But it was beautiful to her, and then-

They were flying. Lovely.

Before she knew it, she was astride him, taking her moment like she was claiming a prize. She felt him pulsing, throbbing between her legs, mere threads away all of him. Sansa knew she was... aroused, but it was only when she felt her underskirt cling to her sex that she realized just what she was doing to her. Every vein seemed to pump and quiver, all heading downward, ripples of pleasure like warm winds flowing through her from her wetness. She rolled her hips and gasped again, hands almost twisting into claws against the mat of hair on his chest. 

She wondered if it would even all fit inside her, that day when-

"This... will have to do..."

It seemed a while before he found his voice. Longer still before she found her ears, and when she did, she giggled and closed her eyes.

"Until what?"

"Until I can have you inside me," she looked down and smiled at the stunned look on his face, then saw it crumble as her hips moved again, her body eager, ravenous for more of him under her. Two thin layers of fast-soaking were all there was between them, and it was not enough, not _nearly_ enough. "But... for now..."

"Gods, Sansa," rasped the man who had no belief in anything but sharp steel and strong arms. Sansa giggled, feeling... almost drunk. Did that make her his goddess?

"Mmmmm... yes?"

Sandor was not a man to take an assault without answer, and she felt her muscles tighten then loosen and quiver as he joined their dance. His crotch rose and rubbed against her, and she could feel the tip of him pushing against... that. That hard little bean of tingling, jabbering nerves above her sex, and every time he did she gripped him a little tighter. 

"You ruin me, girl..."

Sansa bit her lip with a grin and tightened her knees around him. At least he felt the same way, and then... and then there were-

No thoughts. Just feelings. Sensations. Waves that rose up her, crashed through her innards and flowed back to her womanhood with every buck and rise. She felt every part of her, every curl of her hair as she let her head fall back and it tickled her back. His hands stroking her thighs, gliding over her stomach, heated palms against her breasts, thumbs twirling around her nipples and making her shake and gasp in stuttering bursts.

For a moment and an hour and a night they rode against each other, crashing like tides, and she felt herself tighten and twist, tension like a wire pulled tight but always she held herself back. She knew something was building, bubbling like an eruption but gods, she didn't want this to end. She was high above herself, floating in all she could give him and then his hand slid under her shift and his thumb brushed against her nub-

Her mouth opened to scream but it was strangled, drowned, killed before it could burst as he gripped her thighs hard against him, hands fists against his chest and she shattered, burst, mouth slack in a soundless cry...

She knew she slumped against him, boneless and feeble, in the same way she knew what color blue was. But there was no sensation, no feeling in her touch. Just the hot, tingling pulse from her most intimate place. His breath in her hair, coming out in hard, ragged bursts like he'd ran across half the country, sweat mingling with hers as his arms enveloped her...

Sansa felt moisture pool between her legs, and not all of it was hers. With supreme effort, she managed to drag a hand between them... and felt his short breeches as soaked as her own. 

"Did... you...?"

"What... What is it with... you and s... silly... oh, to hells with it-"

Even his kiss seemed exhausted but gods if she didnt swallow it down, mold herself against his lips and neck and his chest, sliding off him and down do she was tucked against his chest, a great living mattress for her, slick and hard and heaving. 

There were no words. Not for what they had done nor how they felt after, and the long, wondrous look they shared. His hands stroked the lank, wet strands from her face until she could not hide behind them... and she did the same for him, until all of him was open to her... and she pressed her lips to first one cheek, then the other. His sigh came out as if from the ages, shake of his head speaking of an unknowable riddle.

"What is it?"

He smiled at her, eyes heavy and lidded. Spent. Gods, did _she_ do that to him? Well, there was no-one else...

"Something new, hmm?"

"Tell me you didn't enjoy it."

He didn't. He kissed her deep with his fingertips on her cheeks, nipping at her lips until they were swollen and tingling and Sansa felt that same weight behind her eyes. She smiled sleepily one last time, and planted a kiss on his nose.

"Until that day?"

"Aye, little bird," he whispered to her, then pulled the furs over them and there, for that moment, for that night, she could pretend _this_ was true, as they were and as they should always be. "Aye..."

Sansa closed her eyes and her body floated from her along with the rise of his chest, the heat of his breath and the howling wind muted behind the oak walls. She was running on clawed feet, towards the ice and storm. She was not alone. Ahead of her a great and tireless beast led the pack, pounding through the grass and ice and snow. She did now know where they were going, but she knew they were her pack. Her arms tightened from sleep into the real, and found him there. 

 

**THE WATCHER**

_I did not wake. There was no wake when you did not sleep, just as there was no sleep when the real was blurred between that time and this time and all times._

_I was elsewhere, in the world. I was of wing and fur. I was in rivers and in woods and in dreams. But I knew, as a thread tugged within me, that it was time. To cast my eyes of a thousand and one, back to that place of..._

_Her. So many souls, a great tide of them. Now moving. Beasts and men. Lords and smallfolk. A night's sky of pulsing light, all turned towards one goal._

_A distant place. I knew its roofs. Its towers. Now darkness of men, not daemons, rested over it, cloaked it like a choking shroud. They sought to change that. She was with them now, this great and desperate expedition._

_I circled and felt the air rush through feathers that were mine and not mine. Swooped lower and through sheets of falling snow. Saw banners and liveries, faces and helmets, a great warrior that throbbed like a torch among matches with angry, restless life._

_Next to one that blazed with a soul kin to my own. A flash of flame from under her cloak and I called to her-_

_She looked up and saw my body, but not me. I called again and she frowned, then she rushed past._

_I watched. It was all I could do, at first. But the last was no longer the last, because he had whispered to me the children's wisdom. It was as the old man had said: a different kind of knowledge. Heard. Understood. Then used... like magic.  
_

_Feathers and high, mocking caws vanished. I was on that island, imprisoned in bark and falling leaves. That carved face was mine, and I could spy the village emptying of life. A train of men and horses and carts and donkeys, all moving east, towards their objective._

_A line of intent. A thread among a tapestry greater than even the stern king could understand. I sighed and fancied my breath leak out with the red sap._

_So much to say, and unable to. But I was still learning. The last-no-more had plenty to teach, and every day, as the darkness closed on us in that root-riddled cavern, I felt that last fire burn stronger and brighter._

_I breathed without lungs and lips and tongue, and I was apart again. Flying where I could not walk._

_They would war and struggle and I could see twisted fragments of their end._

_But it was not the end of all. So much lay ahead... so much greater and more terrible..._

_I swelled and marshalled the green within me, drawing it from root and breast and time beyond meaning. Hours sped and there was dream, soft and pliable to my learnings. She was there, before our father's weirwood._

_I speak as best I can. I tell her of the aid I send, in words plain to me but to her... ravings. Visions. But true. Always so awfully true._

_Skittering, scratching in the darkness. Twittering in words older than stone, ken to a handful still living, if that is even the term for it._

_Yes, I say, as the three-fingered hand touches my own. They are still coming._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Plenty of critique, if you have it in you! Not used to writing the bouncy-bouncy, though fuck knows there's a big enough body of work to draw from around HERE... oh, and apologies in advance to all lovely lady readers. Dunno what a female orgasm feels like, so I trawled various sites that... I otherwise would not have, as a red-blooded male (ahem) to get some semblance of an idea. 
> 
> *bops around dorkily to "Shut Up and Dance" by Walk The Moon*
> 
> Hey, shut up, it wrote this fucking chapter...


	27. Chapter 27

**DONAL**

"Aye, big black bastard swooped low after the Tyrells fell back and it was just us poor Westerland pikers. Lost me brother. Me uncle's boys. Good lads... I got out with half me fucking face burned off, lucky cunt that I am. So don't go on about the Dragon Queen's fucking _pets_ around _me_ , d'ye mark?"

_Since when did you get so good at horseshit, old man?_

"No fear a' that, friend," said the man with a clipped, proper Crownlands voice jarring with the raper's mark burned onto one cheek. The man smirked and gestured for more drinks. "Daenerys may be on the throne back home, but out here? She's just another topic of fuckin' gossip, y'know? We've got more important things to bloody worry about, like keeping our heads on our shoulders."

The handful of men at the table replied with grunts and nodded and glared around, as if daring anyone else in the shebeen to argue. Sandor keeps his gaze steady on the man who seems their captain, not letting contempt mar them. Clad in a whirl and clash of arms and armors from Westeros, the Free Cities and beyond, every man had the look of a jackal on the verge of eating its own legs. Sandor had seen broken men before, but these men were not so. They were simply men without honor or restraint, who would betray their comrades for two coins and butcher the harmless and helpless for three... and gods, _now_ he understood what a hideous thing that was.

_Mayhap because you don't count yourself among them. If only you had years before._

Sandor shook his head and banished those pointless musings. That time was _dead_ , damnit, and he had business that night. He leaned forward and waited until the painted wench had plopped more sloshing cups onto the table.

"Came in 'ere a few nights back, saw a couple of your sort. Sellswords, pretty bloody obvious. Now I see you and yer lads here, eyes open, heads on a swivel... looks t'me like you're recruiting."

"And if we are?"

Sandor patted the hilt of his bastard. The handle of his longsword was poking over his shoulder, clear to all. "Got my own steel, my own armor, my own steed. All I'm lookin' for now is purpose and coin. Been too long without the madness, y'know?"

A wave of split lips and blackened teeth answered him, eyes glazed over with sweet, warm memory. Coin was not the only reason Hiller's men followed him. Sandor could tell that from their eyes. Always hungry, feral and snapping their jaws even when their mouths were closed. Gold and wine and food and cunt could fill it, but killing? For some men, that quenched it the best of all, and he saw that dark yearning in half the faces at that table.

He thought of Vargo Hoat and his mummers. Gregor's monsters, so ordinary in manner until you looked into their eyes. The ironborn. The Boltons. Those that came after... and now these thugs playing at soldiers, scraping up scum for the sausage-grinder that was the Disputed Lands.

_No. You are among them now, so you can damn well count yourself such._

_Maybe that will make it easier._

"Oh, we could use you, I'm sure of that," Hiller's eyes flickered over the giant in his old but well-kept armor, the longsword and bastard and dirk... the hideous face, scorched by dragonfire down to bones and tendons. Sandor would have thought that wold be enough, but Hiller hadn't survived this long without asking the right questions. "You running from anything? Anything that might run _after you_ with us poor sods?"

Sandor knew to hesitate was to hide, so he swallowed down the rest of his cup instead, draining it deep, tipping it back... ah... that came to him easier. Returned to him, rather. The stupefaction of drink. The way it muddled your fears and your doubts like an oil painting mixed into itself. Soon all you saw was a mass of grey that served as your past. The way it stung at your tongue and gums and you wondered why the hells you bothered with it. Until it numbed your. Body and soul. 

Oh, yes. Sandor remembered that. Half his life as a drunk, then a sober man, but which was easier to fall into?

"Nah," he said with a smack of his gums, gesturing for another. "Just bloody bored back home. Fucking Dragon Queen and that..." _Say it. **Say it** , damn you and throw these dogs off any scent._ "... Northern bitch have got everything so fucking _peaceful_." Sandor shook his head in disgust like the word was as hateful to him as water to flames. "Last decent war was nigh-on seven years back. Nah... more like eight. Now...?"

He waved a hand dismissively and wary faced nodded their agreement. _Hiller_ made a little "hmm" and nodded, staring into his cup. 

"Yes, I remember. That's when most of us made ourselves scarce across the Narrow Sea. No stopping the Dragon Queen after that. But mayhap we can wait. She can't live forever. Neither can her dragons. The Golden Company tread that path once... why not the Shattered Shields?"

 _Because_ , Sandor thought, unspoken words spitting venom even as his mouth curled into a comforting smile (as much as it could), _**they** were ten thousand-strong, commanded by veteran soldiers and warriors, with engineers, cavalry, crossbowmen and fucking mammoths, and they didn't take just any scum that had a sword on their belt. You, on the other hand, are a few hundred fucking shit-stains who couldn't hack it in Westeros and can barely hack it in the Free Cities._

"I'll drink to that."

They all did, and Hiller hunched his shoulders in, arms crossed on the table, muttering low to Sandor of his "contract". Myr and Pentos were about to come to blows, why he had no bloody clue, and didn't care. All he cared about was that Myr had offered his "company" - _fine name for a band of bloody murderers_ \- the chance to fight, and the price was quite juicy.

"Fifty gold pieces for each man, after the job's done," Hiller said with a grin, like his hundred little bag of gold for each man was all the wealth in the Iron Bank. "Had to beat 'em up from twenty-five, though, grasping bastards..."

Sandor's eyes flickered around the table at the grateful faces of his men... then the way Hiller's own studied them over the rim of his glass.

_Oh, I bet you fucking did..._

"When're you leaving?"

"Two days, I think. Gotta take the overland, 'cause of the animals, but that won't take us more than a few days. When we get to Pentos, we'll form up and some fat magistar will tell us where to go." Hiller sat back in his chair, palms flat on the table and jerked his chin towards him. "So? Interested?"

_I'd like to cut you all open, you grasping, cutthroat bastards, and paint the room with your guts... but I need you. For now._

He raised his cup again and smirked. On his bad side. "Aye. I'm with yeh."

Moments later the band struck up and gods, it seemed to be his cue. Sandor's ears pricked as he heard the first shuddering strings, then the bass treble of the drums... and he knew The Dragon Riders was soon to boom around the tavern. A dozen patrons raised their cups and cheered, mostly Westerosi or, he'd wager, freed slaves who would always worship Daenerys as a goddess... but Sandor was not one of them. 

They threw his mind back to frozen fields of the North, or sunny plains of the South. Men and monsters screaming and flailing as flames ate them. But worst was the lyrics, all noble and soaring, talking about victory and glory and "swift flame on shining wing".

_Like **they** fucking know what it was like._

"I'm off, lads," Sandor said, rising swiftly to his feet and dropping a coin onto the table. "For my drinks. Two days, I'll find you here?"

"Aye, you will." Hiller said. The sellsword captain watched the giant lumber away, still barely even faltering even after a half-dozen cups of Myrrish Mullen. Bright, friendly eyes glazed over and turned reptile with his smile. "'Donal', he says," he muttered, sharing a secret glance of conspiracy with his bearded second. "My fuckin' _arse_..."

Sandor did not hear. He was already deafened as the Braavosi were belting out their great tale of dragons and queens and riders and heroes, and he didn't want to bloody hear it. He burst out into the street and there was no blast of cold air to sober him; just the endless malaise of sweaty fug that ever-settled over this floating fucking city. He rubbed a hand over his face and... the music was still there. Taking him back where he didn't want to go. He was a sellsword now, lowest of low, and he needed to remember that. Couldn't afford, couldn't risk holding onto the past-

-like the black mouth in the ground, and the fidgeting shadows waiting with him in the night. Her. Always her, in every memory he still cared to have. 

"Two days," he muttered to himself, spitting to the gutter and wishing he could purge his mind so easily. "Two days and yer gone..." 

 

**SANSA**

The Boltons knew they were coming. She didn't need to be _told_ that.

The foraging squads were ranging far and thorough ahead of the slogging column, now riding with picks and shovels to dig through the frozen ground for anything edible. Or often not, so she was hearing. Tree bark and boiled roots were now touted as "soup", mayhap with some crushed acorns for flavor. They were slaughtering horses every day for meat, and even with such big beasts butchered from hooves to ears, a single cutlet was often all that could be pressed into a man's hand.

So the foragers went further, and further... and one day the pickets beyond Winterfell sounded their horns, and Sansa heard them.

_My father's home. My family's seat since the Long Night. Now we're invading it like we're..._

She couldn't even finish the thought. Wildlings? Boltons? Ironborn? _Lannisters?_ The very _notion_ of comparison made her stomach twist and squirm and she batted it away, concentrated on the horizon, as much of it as she could see. The blizzards were growing in strength, as if the gods of ice and snow were for the Boltons. Every morning a slew of men were found cold and frozen, sleeping in the snow forever. Left to their slumber, no time to bury or even burn them. Sansa was seeing men emerge from the night with black, dead lumps on their noses, ears, fingers... and that was just where she _could_ see. Some of them waited for the pain to become so bad they had to be cut off; others grumbled and groused like it was a minor inconvenience, and lopped off the pointless scrap of gristle themselves.

Sansa had to admit, it was a point of pride to her that the former were mostly Southrons, and the latter Northerners. 

"You sure you can still find this cave, boy?"

Sansa barely heard Sandor over the wind and the rushing curtains of white, but Niall seemed to do just fine.

"Aye! S'under a clumpa' trees on the north side, in a hillside!"

"Pretty big bloody area to search over!"

"Guess yer just gonna have to trust me, Clegane!"

Sandor suggested that Niall do something physically impossible with his "trust" and Sansa forgot the cold for a moment to laugh into air so cold it _burned_ when you swallowed it. The smile stayed on her face, though.

The nights have been freezing in their tent, but Sandor... he'd never let go of her. He wrapped himself around her in a way that rendered the idea of cold moot and pointless. Though icy tendrils foisted their way under the flaps and corners, he was always there to ward them away, even after he'd woken up blue-skinned and Sansa had begged him in her waking whisper not to be so foolish.

"I s-swore to prot-tect you," he'd stuttered through chattering teeth as she rubbed her hands all over him, like a monkey trying to warm a bear. "Have... Have to keep you... warm-"

"And how will you do that when you're dead?"

"Wouldn't... matter-"

"It would to me, you..." She wanted to finish the scathing sentence but finally just shook her head with a disgusted huff and piled furs on him until he was ready to move again. "I'm not _asking yo_ u to lose fingers and toes for me, Sandor."

"You... You don't _have_ to... to ask." 

She leveled her best "Lady Stark" glare at him, but found only a pair of steely grey eyes peeking at her from his cave of furs. For an absurd moment, he looked vulnerable to her. Small. Cold. But his eyes did not waver and she felt a tingle, a glow in her, like he was pledging himself all over again. Her glare faded and she looked down at her lap, speaking into it rather than at him. 

"Just be careful, Sandor. Stay warm. We have plenty of covers."

"Yes... little hawk..."

She smiled at the memory as the light waned behind them in the west, but it too vanished when there, a rising bulk of solid black against the racing night and young mountains of snow, was Winterfell. Sansa breathed in hard and deep and cared not for the ice in her lungs.

Four years. Mayhap even longer. No, _five_ years apart from her home and now... she could see the scars wrought upon it.

Hearths and bonfires burning inside buildings that no longer had roofs. Towers that she had memorized without even thinking, and now she could see many of their number were gone. Just... fallen, vanished, like spires of stone and mortar were children's toys to be knocked down at will. The Great Hall still stood but collapsing masonry had gouged holes in it like it had been mauled and her mother's sept-

Sansa bowed her head and felt the tears burn and then freeze on her cheeks. They'd destroyed it. Savages. _Animals_.  

Sandor and Wylis and Jonelle and Stannis were with her, or they were with _him_ , more accurately, but none of them tried to put words to her pain. She felt a meaty hand brush against hers, just for a moment, and when she looked up, Sandor's face was glaring forward, as if her sprawling home had done him mortal injury. She still managed a shaky smile. He thought not of her inheritance and her home; he thought of the filth within, and how he would enjoy purging them.

"We shall make camp here," King Stannis said, turning his head just enough to catch Sansa's eye. "Tonight Sandor and his party will leave. Tomorrow, we shall retake your castle, Lady Stark."

The certainty of it... like he was prophesying something as simple and obvious as the rising of the sun or the wetness of water. Sansa knew that it was Stannis' way, to speak with surety at all times, for he was both king and prophet. But she liked to think she saw an ember of humanity in his eyes when he spoke. A promise. 

But the night would come, inevitable as The Stranger's embrace, and when the camp was made, a small portion of it went immediately to their beds and cots and tents. Sandor was among them. They would be spending some of the night and most of the morning listening to every sound, every scrape, every chittering, skittering scuttle in the crypts of Winterfell, and _then_ fight a damn battle. They needed their rest. 

Sansa watched him sleep inside their tent, as she swept and dug a hole in front of it, made a circle of rocks, a little cone of twigs and branches, tinder underneath it... everything he taught her. She smiled as she worked, even as her fingers were scratched and her palms scraped. She still remembered that little hut just south of the Neck, still really in The Vale. On those nights when his musk and muscle were all she was aware of, Sansa dreamed... and wondered...

_We could have stayed there. No-one would have come looking, not there. We could have hunted rabbits and deer, gathered berries and wild vegetables, made the hut bigger... built more than just rooms and roofs. No-one would-_

_Yes, they would have. You are heir to the North and he is the Lannister's rabid dog. **No-one** would have come; **every and many** would have. _

She scraped the flint hard... harder... gods, there was even ice on the metal that was struck for flames every day. Sansa stretched her stiff fingers and gripped harder, scraping faster, flint squeaking and snapping in protestation, but there were sparks, first shooting stars and then scattered waves-

Smoke followed a moment later and Sansa carefully added little twists of tinder now and then, adding to it, letting the flames grow almost like it was a flower, until it bloomed under the cone and kissed the dry wood, embraced it and burned it down... 

"Well done."

She looked over her shoulder, and he was there, lying on his side, hair a glorious mess over his forehead and face, grey eyes twinkling like distant comets and the slash of his teeth like ivory. Sansa bit her lip and gods, would he _ever_ stop doing that to her insides? She knew every other woman would think she'd run mad to express such an attraction, but they never _knew_ Sandor. They never saw that warmth, that devotion that didn't twist his face in a sneer, but healed his brother's cruelty and spread it from lips to nose to eyes. She let her eyes rest on him as he brushed his hair away, stretching the stiffness from his muscles.

_Still a young man. I always forget that. Barely even past his thirtieth year, and in the form of a man ten years younger._

She bit down harder when he arched his back and the muscles of his chest and stomach pressed against his tunic, every hard line tight and plain for her approving eye. Some small part of Sansa mourned and shuddered at his shattered face, but as their days grew in number and the distance between them shrunk... gods, she barely saw them. 

_Oh, yes. In his prime..._

Until his eye snapped open and latched straight on her red face, and he smirked.

"Stop that!"

"Stop what?" He shrugged and grinned even wider. "I'm stretching. Can't blame a man for that, after a long-"

"I'll throw twigs at you!"

"Oh, fear clutches at my-"

Sansa made good on her threat and a moment later the most ferocious man-killer in the Seven Kingdoms was desperately warding away tiny projectiles launched by... someone who was definitely _not_. She giggled and ignored the looks of bemused confusion on the faces of the men that slouched her, letting out stunned little squeals when Sandor retaliated with far more accuracy. 

"I surrender! I surrender!"

"Bloody right you do..."

The fire was dancing and snapping gratefully at her, so she let it be, let it to grow, and ducked back in their tent to find him already strapping on his armor. She watched. She watched just like before, trying to commit all of him to memory. His armor was so... battered. Scuffed and dented in places, but he never thought to replace it, just buffed and polished it all the same. He mumbled something once about dented armor "proving it can do its damn job". But by bit, cloth was replaced by metal and and he loomed yet larger, struggling with his last gauntlet, always fiddly when his other hand was suddenly fingered by fat, leather-bound sausages-

"Here, let me."

His head jerked up in surprise and he sputtered something but before he could get it all out-

There she was. The heir to Winterfell, gently but firmly buckling his gauntlet like his squire. She could feel the heat of his gaze... the surprise... something else that drew her head up... just as his own hand, cold and hard, an extension of his warring ways, brushed her cheek.

"Little hawk..."

She snorted and finished the final clasp. "I have a new name?"

"One that fits. You are more than just a twittering songbird in its cage, Sansa. You are strong and wise and fierce in your way. You have claws to go with your beauty."

The fire was outside but she felt the heat warm her cheeks nonetheless. Sandor was not a poetic man, and hearing such fine, glowing words...

"Mayhap you require one, also. Hound is hardly a suit for you now."

"I am your-"

"No," she said, sharper than she'd intended, but she couldn't bare, even now, with her as his liegewoman, not Joffrey, to hear him negate all his courage and call himself a dog. "More than just a hound." Her eyes glittered and she stared into those twin orbs of mist and snowy cloud, shining like the moon hid behind them, "More a... a wolf."

He didn't speak, not for long moments. He blinked, and that was all the hint he gave to his astonishment. Wolves were of the North. They always had been. They were seen in the South, true, but for a Northerner to call a Southron so... it meant much. Especially from one whose very sigil was a snarling direwolf, huge and proud and fierce.

"I... Sansa-"

"Clegane?"

Niall had a talent for talentless timing, she thought. Their hands dropped quickly and Niall cleared his throat, pretending he hadn't seen and they that he wasn't pretending. Behind him there was a forest of waiting legs, breech-clad and mailed and with ax and pick handles resting on the frozen mud.

"That time?"

"Aye, it's time." The boy glanced between them both and nodded a touch to Sansa. "I'll tell them yer still getting your boots on."

Sansa beamed and Niall gave her a wink too much like Sandor's.

"He knows."

"Of course he knows," Sandor said with a lopsided smile. "I didn't drag him along just for one scrap of information. Boy has a brain in his head."

"Not like you to trust so easily."

The smile didn't fade, but it froze, as if in wonder, eyes glazing over. "I've learned much since I met you."

Another blow to her. Sansa felt some strange but feverish panic seize her as she heard these words that were so unlike him. They were almost like a confession, the last blurting of words never spoken before a man knew he faced his end. She seized his arms sudden and fast, her own eyes wet and she thought of that bitch queen's words. About tears being a weapon. She would have wielded them now, if they kept him close to her, and safe. 

"Don't die," she said, so simple and childish, but with all the rasped, whispered force she could muster. "I... I don't care if you have to turn craven and run, don't die-"

"I'll not turn craven for _anyone_ , Sansa." He tried to keep his voice measured, but her words had touched some point of his pride and now he bristled at them. A moment later that hardness faded and he tipped her chin upward. Gods, he was so tall. She barely came up to his shoulder. "But I'll not die. I'll not leave you again."

"Men always _think_ that, Sandor," she said fiercely, her words coming out choked and backed with spittle, all her hate and despair of men and their stupid fucking honor spilling out of her as if she would never speak them again. "That _their_ skill, _their_ comrades, _their_ cause, _their_ gods, their _damned luck_ , all of it will keep _them_ alive but they _don't_ come back, and if they do they're... they're..."

She couldn't finish. She shook her head and closed her eyes and her lids squeezed out bitter, angry tears, images of his pale body under a shroud taunting her. She'd lost so much, and so many. She knew with some terrible certainty that losing him, closest to her in those cold days, would rip out what little warmth she still had left in her breast. She would never trust it again, nor the gods to be kind and wise. She looked up and before she could prattle further, his lips pressed to hers and she was weeping now, shoulders bobbing and he held her tight.

Niall's feet in front of the flap. A too-loud throat clearing. _Come now, don't be all night, these lads aren't stupid..._

"All my life... there has only ever been one," he said, voice a low murmur, soaked in something only for her ears. She looked up at him and found his eyes sorrowful, but that animal lust to live and conquer glowering behind them. "I never... I don't remember my mother. She... she died giving us Annalyn. But my sister... I loved her. She was life and laughter and all the kindness I never had. I _failed her_ , Sansa. I couldn't save her from him. Couldn't save _anyone_ from him." He shook his head and the sorrow died, replaced with will enough for them both. "I _won't_ fail again. Not tonight, not tomorrow, not you. Not now... now there is another."

Sansa swallowed as she heeded him. She wanted to hold him on that cold ground and force more words from him, marry her name to that feeling, but she knew to do so would be more than he could give. So instead she kissed his cheeks and her hands worked feverishly at her dress, drawing his confused stare-

-and then there was a ribbon pressed into his massive leather mitt, a scrap of grey and blue. Snow and roses. Her hands closing those fat fingers over it, hiding it, their secret just as what they bore for each other was.

It was so... perfect. Not what it was, or for it was whom, but for all that had changed between them. Sandor who hated knights and chivalry, who sneered at fine ladies and their empty prettiness. Now he was taking her favor and she saw no glimmer of scorn or mockery in his eyes when they met hers. 

"I will see you tomorrow," she said, forcing herself to still the tremble in her voice and her shoulders. She breathed deep and exhaled... and she was Lady Stark again. She nodded. "Come back to me. My wolf."

Sandor's jaw clenched and ground for a moment. Then he nodded back and turned fast, as if he wanted to leave her in a rush or he may not be able to do it. The snow lashed him and he didn't so much as flinch. He looked around them all, arrayed and waiting with grim purpose, Niall by his side.

"Alright, lads," she heard him say, voice a commanding growl, the kind of vicious strength that fighting men would follow into hell. "Let's follow the boy, fuck these flayed cunts up their arses and nail 'em to the _fucking walls!_ "

A cheer rose, throaty and raw and spurring the cold from their bones. Sansa listened to the tumult of boots pounding and crunching away from the tent, and only when they faded did she allow herself to sink to the bed of furs - _their_ bed - and let soft tears drip from her eyes, lips moving and pleading to all and none.

_Please... Please... Please..._

  

**THE WHISPERING LORD**

He'd always had a voice for high-roofed halls and carousing feasts, so he supposed the gods had a strange sense of humor when they robbed him of it. He just wished they'd chosen a prettier vessel for their will than Hosteen Frey.

"My Lord? Your soup?"

Wyman smiled his thanks at Ser Eric, not risking his voice. He'd only to breath and he felt air gurgling through the gash in his throat, rather than through his mouth as the gods intended. The bearded knight waited patiently until his lord could wriggle and heave his bulk into a comfortable position and take the bowl with one hand, only to fumble with the spoon- 

"Damn-"

-Ser Rufus was there to catch it, carefully returning it to those fat fingers.

"No harm done, my Lord."

Wyman raised a caterpillar eyebrow that spoke more than his words could. _Oh, a great deal of harm has been done_ , they said, _just not today, or by our hands._  

The serving girl bobbed a quick curtsey and then knocked on the door to Wyman's chambers. A glowering Dreadfort bastard opened it quickly, cast his eyes around to make sure she was alone in leaving, then stepped aside. Three other men were in the hall, armed and clad as if for battle, and Wyman would guess there were plenty of others in the hallway. Roose had told him he was to "convalesce and recover" in the tower, but both of them and any man with eyes and a brain could see his "healing" for what it was: he was a prisoner, and a hostage. He had but a handful of men left to protect him, the rest vanishing into the snow and storms with those Frey bastards, Hosteen leading them...

Vanishing. Never to be seen again. Six days and no messenger, no word, no raven.

Wyman had smiled grimly at the continued silence from Roose's Frey dog. Stannis had smashed him, he knew it. Hosteen Frey was a beefy sod who liked to style himself as the champion of The Twins, but he was naught but a pike in their river, and these were far more dangerous waters he found himself in. Stannis Baratheon had crushed the Greyjoys during their rebellion, held out against the Tyrells during his brother's when a lesser man would have surrendered, came within a hair from storming King's Landing and then shattered a wilding army nigh a hundred times larger than his own. Hosteen Frey was nothing to him, but his own men... his cavalry, and Ser Kamber...

_Back to White Harbor, mayhap. But why? What would they gain?_

Gods, there was nothing left for him to do but lie on his several arse-cheeks and ponder, pointlessly plot and uselessly scheme. Second guess himself and Roose and far-off Lannisters. He had played his farce so well, but let his mummery slip too far off the stage. Now he was a prisoner of Roose, his men were gone, and now he was no better off than the Greatjon. Little more than living leverage, forcing his beloved son to bend the knee and kowtow to that fucking Leech Lord. Sometimes, like that morning, his whispers and doubts and the debris of his ruined schemes seemed to deafen him and-

"Do you hear that?"

Wyman's head rolled like a boulder to the far window, bright with that deceptive Winter light. He could. Gods, he _could_. 

Men shouting and crying out, hundreds of feet pounding on stone and beams. Weapons clanking along with armor. Gates being raised and shut, doors slamming, horns, drums... men preparing for battle and siege. 

"My Lord?!"

"Up, man! Up!" 

The two knights gulped but dared not defy their lord so animated, especially after so many days with that dead, hopeless glaze to his features. Now he was a wriggling, squirming mass of lard, determined on rising even with his fat neck made all the more gross by thick bandages. They strained and grunted, each with a neck under his arm, until they all waddled comically to the window...

"By the gods. My Lord, is that...?"

Lord Wyman Manderly smiled, though it pulled muscles at his neck that pinched and stung. A great force on foot and horse was arrayed to the north, lining the white-blasted hill half a league from the North Gate. He squinted his piggy eyes and saw the flaming banner of Stannis, the ready ax of House Cerwyn, a few hundred of whom were within those very walls. What seemed like thousands of wild mountain clansmen, already howling and beating their chests with their skull-cracking staffs and horse-beheading greatswords... pikemen and knights, and the banner of the merman, proud and high in the wind, off to the far right opposite the gate, green and white. Wyman felt wetness crease the corner of one eye when he saw a familiar bulk at their head, like looking back in time to his own earlier manhood.

"My son," he said, voice a rustling rasp of wind through dried leaves. "My son has come... and not alone." 

And one banner in particular. One that was making the miniature men on the battlements point and jabber, and Wyman's jaw dropped as he praised the Seven that at least one of his fool plans had birthed sweet fruit.

Grey and white, next to Stannis. Recently made, by the looks of it, or pilfered from some unlikely hiding place, rough black image hardly fit for a Great Hall. But the roaring, vengeful direwolf was clear, even from that distance. Flapping and flailing above a hooded horseman, cloaked in grey and white.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Let the bodies hit the floor, let the bodies hit the floor, let the bodies hit the..."


	28. Chapter 28

**ROOSE**

I feel tiny teeth sink into me. Sharp little needles in lipless mouths, hungry and insistent. The maester swallows and I can hear it, a distant, muffled splash of effluence into his stomach. Strange how such a learned man can be so disgusted by this art. Mayhap he should attempt it. 

"Another."

So I say and so the words comes again and again, until they are all in place on that stained wooden chair. Half a score of hungry little tubes of slime and salivation, existing only to consume and, I suppose, reproduce. Pins gouge at me, in me and I gasp in the cold air. Pain... but pain is good. Strength always comes from pain, and as it does weakness is leeched from the body. I close my eyes and I can feel the suck and push of my blood into their bodies. _Take it_ , I think, _take it and purge me, that flesh may mirror thoughts._

"W-Will there be, anything else, my Lord?"

"Not for the moment. You may go."

He does and I am splendidly alone with the wriggling little beasts. I try to begin my days this way. Nothing but those mindless creatures and my own thoughts, twisting and building fresh entertainments. Soon I would walk from my chambers and a sea of faces and personalities would swamp me, but they are all meat to my will now. Warden of The North. Lord of Winterfell. I can see the fear in their eyes, the hate they think they hide...

I smile in the low light of the room, silent save for the soft suckling of their mouths. 

Manderly. The fat lord will take all my skill and patience to properly flay; all of the night, too, most likely. Do I even have a dummy big enough for all those rolling folds? Well, it will be an amusement to find out... and find out I shall. The Manderly's think that their jolly japing covers their deceit; that in all the North, only they can plot in the shadows, move their spies and agents like pieces on a board. 

Lord Lamprey thought he could fetch Rickon Stark from Stagos like a package from the market, but my Bastard has seen to that. The raven three days past proved as much. Now the boy is in the Dreadfort, along with the smuggler Wyman sent, his wolf slain along with the wildling woman that was guard and septa both. A message sent to White Harbor. Such a joy it will be to tell Lord Wyman of all he attempted, and I have destroyed.

His face when it falls. Sucked dry of all defiance and jolly facade like these leeches were attached to it. I'll tell him of how Stannis and the North will never have the boy to use, and that as soon as practical, I'll have him condemned as a traitor against his true liege. 

And just before I start with those sharp, lovely knives, I will tell him that he has _lost_. That will be worst and sweetest of all.

It is a warm and soothing feeling, as my blood drains and my mind wanders. So much to set into motion and stop against my own, but what else can occupy my mind? It is an endless game, even if there are no thrones for me to sit on, and I am not blind to all those that would have my head. But they will fail. All of them. 

Ramsay... the only thing that can intrude on my solitude. Foolish boy. Useful, certainly, but far too imprudent. Domeric wouldn't have had the cunning nor the daring to disguise himself at Winterfell and bring the ax down on the Starks at their root. Nor the... practicality, to butcher the ironborn at Moat Cailin and leave their skinless corpses on the causeway as a message to all that would enter _my_ North. And was it not Ramsay who snatched the Stark boy from Wyman's man, dragged him to the Dreadfort, our hostage for as long as we will?

True. All true. True as his savagery turning House Hornwood against us years ago, violating, maiming and starving his first wife. True as his amusements with peasant girls earning him the bile and disgust of all who heard them, small and high. True as the weeping from his chambers of the false Stark girl, his love for cruelty churning betrayal and hatred with every passing night in the hearts of all in these walls.

I sigh. It is a dry sound. Cold. As it should be. Ramsay is heat and passion and it ruins him. Makes him vulnerable and thus myself. I make a note to come to my fat little wife more often, starting that night, until I put a son in her. I may be advancing in years, but I still have firmness in my breeches, and I need to use it. A bump on her belly, a fast guard around her to keep away Ramsay, and in due time?

I'm no kinslayer. But there are more ways to see a man to his end than a sword in the heart or poison in his cups. 

The more pressing matter of the day is the heavy, obvious silence from the Frey and Manderly force I dispatched to Stannis. Doubtless defeated, but that was expected. Hosteen Frey was a boorish man possessing some skill with a blade; Ser Kamber was far better, at least with a lance. Lords whispered to me afterwards that it was folly, sending out two men who despised each other, depending on them fighting _together_ to defeat Stannis.

I heard their council and reminded them I would never _depend_ on _anything_ but my own men, and my own wits. Two thousand less mouths to feed. Stannis' forces savaged and stymied, even if they triumph. More days for them trapped in the snow and the storms, with food dwindling to nothing. And all the while, myself and my men are warm in the halls of Winterfell, waiting for them to slump to our gates.

Two thousand dead, mayhap. But Freys and Manderlys. Small price, mayhap even something gained. Lord Walder will complain, but he is easily ignored. I am not the Young Wolf, so quick to anger at the lecherous old-

Heavy hammering at the door. Hard enough to cry of danger before words are spoken. I rise swiftly and my hand is at the flaying knife on the chair's arm. A small blade, slightly curved, and sharp enough to cut all the veins of the throat with one swipe, and deeply. 

"Enter!"

Walton. Steelshanks, as the men call him, for the gleaming grey leggings that clank as he walks. His face is a flushed apple and he puffs out his words the moment the door is open.

"My... My Lord Bolton. Men... An army, at the North..."

An army. Not mine. Stannis, it had to be. If it were the Freys or Manderlys returning, his face would not be worried so. He keeps talking as I start throwing on clothes, ripping off leeches and tossing them away to die on the cold, dry stone. 

"Banners?"

"Stannis. Cerwyn." Cerwyn? A house inside these walls? "Mountain clansmen, my lord, no banners, but thousands of them. And... House Manderly." My gaze snaps to him and he straightens. Fear. Good. Let that steel his words. "Horsemen, bearing the banner of Lord Wyman. I think his son leads them. And Lord Bolton, there is a _Stark_ banner, too."

My hands pause only a moment as they pull my chainmail over my head. A Stark banner. Well, there would be. A simple trick, flying the colors of the house you seek to free. Mayhap they intend to stir some discord among the garrison? Well, let them attempt it. Dreadfort men hold the gates, the drawbridges, the highest towers. Let Stannis try to conjure the ghosts of the dead lords that held this place. He will find their memory gives no man a sword, nor the will to use it. 

"Do they have any _Starks_ with them?"

"I... I do not know, my lord. But why not fly the banner if-"

"For _precisely_ the reason there is _doubt_ in your voice, man." I never need to shout. My voice is always measured and controlled. People heed such calm more than they do ravings, I find. Once you show them that you have as much wrath in your cold as they have in their fire. "To befuddle and confuse us. Turn your so-called allies quickly against us, and make the taking of this castle easier. Siege engines? Towers?"

"None we can see, my lord."

"And they have sent emissaries?"

"Six riders. Stannis' banner, the Manderly's and the Starks, a hundred paces or so from the North Gate."

I want to snort my derision all over the floor, but no... I hold it back. Cold. Careful. Remember the leeches. Drawing the mad passion of Ramsay from you, until there is that cold perfection of thought and intent. He and I knew that the girl he married was not the true Arya Stark, but she served her purpose. The oldest daughter is trapped in the South, the Young Wolf is dead, the cripple likewise, and Rickon is locked in the Dreadfort. But Arya? Could she have found her way back to her home, and to Stannis? Possible... possible...

But it does not matter, and that assurance speeds my hands as I pull on the rest of my armor, Walton assisting me. What is _true_ does not matter, not even what can be _proven_ : it is what people _choose_ to believe that sways their hearts and hands. Stannis and his turncloak allies wish to parade their own false Stark? Let them do so. I will hear their words and my men will hear me hurl them back to them and spread word of it. 

Let them lay their pitiful siege, with no implements to make it, and have cold and hunger and disease wither them until even my green boys could smash them. 

I am at the battlements above the North Gate and studying the still line of riders. A stern man at the center, stare as unflinching as carved stone. Stannis, I'd wager. A great bear at his side, probably an Umber, grim and glowering. A woman in mail and breeches, double-headed a peeking from the side of her saddle. Cerwyn banner behind her... ah, Lady Jonelle. Finally finding her courage. A gross specimen who must make his armor creak with every breath, that could only be Wyman's last son, Wylis.

A man unused to riding at the end, wobbling in his seat, greatsword lashed to his back, one hand holding a Stark banner... and the rider next to him, I cannot make out. Her hood hides her features, giving sight to only... hints of color. I squint and it could be the morning sun from the east, casting shadows of red and purple and blinding white. But I think I can see red under that hood. 

I grimace. It matters not. Wyman is mine. An imaginative enough threat to his fat son will cow him. The Umbers will not fight each other, and I'll make it clear that is exactly what I will have happen. Lady Jonelle knows little of war, soft and meek female that she is, and I'll have her men hanged from the walls until she abandons Stannis and turns around to wait at her castle for me to come for her. Stannis has grit and hardness, true, but that will not be enough to scale walls a hundred feet high. He barely breached the walls of King's Landing with twenty thousand men; now he has mayhap a third of that number, likely less. He'll batter his dour head bloody against my walls and stagger away.

The Starks. _There are no Starks_ , I think to myself, _save the one we have. And if it is true, then that is our answer also. We have a Stark. To do with as we wish._  

"They come to strut, not parlay," I say out loud, marching back down the stone steps to the waiting horses. "Launch threats without means to enforce them. Throw shadows and fancies at us. Fine. I shall indulge them this one time, and then leave them to the ice."

The gates open and I notice cold looks cast my way. Soldiers are massing, readying the towers and the murder holes, quivers of arrows and piles of stone for throwing, even buckets of pitch over the gates. Most are Dreadfort men, of course, but others are moving, here and there...

Cerwyn. Umber. Glover. Dustin. Locke. Hornwood. 

All whispering. Passing on the rumors and the sights. 

Unseen chains clank and rankle and the drawbridge groans like a giant before crashing down over the frozen moat. By the time we're over it, the outer gate is open, and we are riding through air like flying ice, over ground hard as rock and shale. The sky is clear and the blizzards rest and reform to the north, giving us a fine stage for this fresh mummery.

I will end these rumors. They have no advantage, no hostages, no hope. I expected better from Stannis.

  

**JONELLE**

"Last time for _this_ nonsense, sweetling..."

She didn't need any reply from Sansa to know her words had struck their mark. The way the girl's glittering eyes matched her wry smile, a subtle feeling of understanding between two highborn women, that was clear to her. The first time Jonelle had met Lady Stark - as a _Lady_ , not just Eddard's daughter -  she had played much the same role. A species of statue, to be seen and comprehended for what she represented in terms of noble blood and swords sworn to her name, but never her mind, her soul, her wants and fears. Jonelle would ever bear a small but firm grudge against the world for that.

Sansa Stark was more than just a face and a name. She had heard her words, talking around Stannis Baratheon himself, carefully bringing together Manderly and Southron, Old Gods and Seven and fire-worshippers, welding together an army from those who had little in common and no interest in finding it. She had been shivering in her castle, resigned to her impotence, not a week before. Now she was riding to free Winterfell. 

Years of highborn upbringing insisted it was knights and kings that made it so. Jonelle knew better. Now her time as a mere pawn was coming to an end.

"Here they come."

Jonelle would normally have rolled her eyes at the superfluous statement, but it was well enough to shake her mind from her thoughts about Sansa. She needed her wits and eyes to match events now, before the gate of Winterfell, now open like some great stone mouth, vomiting riders bearing the flayed man towards them. She counted eight, and at the head was the pale ghoul she had grown to hate from afar.

_Now close enough for my ax. Gods, let him come near, just for one good swing-_

_No. That is not the plan._

They were silent as Roose and his escort drew closer, slowing until their parties were facing each other across a handful of feet. Jonelle could see at a glance that Bolton bought no lords or allies with him; just steel sworn to his will. Dreadfort killers with dark faces and eager eyes, hands brushing and wavering over their swords. She thought it fitting for the man. He had no interest in alliances, webs of friendships and loyalty, only underlings.

_Those he can toy with or dominate. Preferably both._

"Lord Stannis. I expected you some days before. I don't suppose you laid eyes on Hosteen Frey on your way? I see you crossed paths with Ser Kamber, at least."

"I am not here to bandy words with you, Lord Bolton. Surrender your control of Winterfell and see yourself to my custody. That is all I came to say."

"Oh? No preamble? Such a shame. I intended for more spirited conversation in my morning."

"Your Freys are dead, Bolton. The sons of White Harbor have returned to their house. You are low on food and friends, as Kamber has told us, among other things."

"But I still have your father, Wylis. He can't speak too well, but he does live. For a time. Would you like some proof? A finger, mayhap? Something more... intimate?"

"You vile _stain_ on-"

"Threats, veiled or not, will not save you, Roose."

"Roose, is it? I had no idea we were so familiar, Jonelle."

"In this moment, we are, I think. For we hold an ax over your neck, and can drop it whenever we wish. As familiar as I would ever want with you, _my lord_."

"An ax, you say? Like the one at your saddle? Fine words, my lady, but ill-chosen. You have no wheeled towers, no catapults or trebuchets, no rams... not even a handful of ladders, and even if you had, would they be eighty and a hundred feet? I think not and I _know_ not. You have only pretty bolts of cloth in the breeze and the banner of a house near-extinct-"

"But it is not."

Now Sansa spoke, bringing up her pale hands to lower her hood. Roose took in the sight of her with his usual deathly calm. Nary a quick blink nor a swallow. His eyes were the same opaque glass as a moment before, even with a daughter of Winterfell facing him. His men exchanged looks but they were not of fear or doubt. They swallowed this new development and waited for their liege's command.

"Ah. Sansa, I take it?"

"You know it to be so."

"Do I? I thought Eddard's daughter further south, with her new husband."

"Surrender, Lord Bolton," Sansa said evenly, and Jonelle gave a tight smile of pride. Not one to be baited, that girl. Not anymore. Firm of purpose and showing Bolton no weakness. "You cannot hold out against us. You have no allies on their way, your own garrison is at each other's throats, your provisions are running low-"

"Yes-yes-yes." A waving hand, dismissive of all Sansa had endured and all she had to say. "I have heard as much, girl. I'm not impressed, nor intimidated. You may not even be Sansa Stark, just a similar likeness, so I think 'girl' more fitting for you. Where did they find you, anyway? A mummer's troupe? A whorehouse, perhaps?"

"Mind your tongue or-"

"Or what, Greatjon? Oh, no, you are Crowfood, are you not? The Greatjon languishes at The Twins and with one raven, I can have his head tossed into their river. Just like your father, Wylis. And your multitudes, Lady Jonelle, outnumbered greatly by my own. You are all spouting orders like you expect them to be obeyed, but they will not. The cold stays itself for this morning, but by tonight, it shall return, and with friends. You will freeze within sight of me from those battlements behind us. You will starve. And every night, fresh corpses dressed in colors Cerwyn, Umber and Manderly will decorate them, to press upon your men how little power you _really_ have here."

Jonelle's breath hitched as Sansa moved her horse a step closer to Bolton, fury tightening her face and transforming her beautiful features into some sparse and brutal.

"This will be your _only_ chance, Lord Bolton. After this parlay, we will show no mercy-"

"Then I hope Sansa Stark parted with her brother on good terms, girl," Bolton said, and the smile he gave her when Sansa's face crumbled told Jonelle all about the hole that man had in place of his soul. "For if I die, and Winterfell falls from my house, Rickon Stark will join me shortly after, and not _nearly_ so quickly."

The air turned ugly as the looks on every face. The Dreadfort men, eyes dancing with malice to match the slow smiles on their lips. Crowfood showing his teeth and gripping the sword at his side, skin bristling as much as the fur he wore, turned stiff in the cold. Wylis seemed to be barely holding himself back and Jonelle wrapped her fingers around the handle of her ax, _wanting_ Roose to see her to do, hoping to wipe the smirk off his face.

It did not. It widened. Fed of her despair like a leech on an open wound. 

"Lord Bolton," Stannis said, voice devoid of warmth and mercy and anything human. "Lady Sansa - and that _is_ who this lady be - _knows_ you have her brother. Lord Wylis, his father. Lord Umber, the Greatjon. They all _know_ , and yet they are here. They have bent knees unused to bending, united under my claim to take Winterfell. And we shall. Turn your words to those of surrender, or by the Lord of Light, the Seven and however many old gods you please, I will have you burned alive tonight."

If there was anything Jonelle could admire about Roose, it would be his cool under pressure. A parade of souls who wanted nothing but his death, backed up by thousands who would see it done, and the man just snorted and turned his horse.

"You have my answer. Mayhap in a few nights, when your men are mad with hunger and frostbite, I will offer some clemency, if only-"

Then they heard it. A great moaning shout from a hundred mouths and more. First one vast sound in unison, then chopped up in the air by the clash of steel on steel, screams a counterpoint in the bloody symphony. All eyes, on both sides of the parlay, snapped to the huge expanse of still stone, the battlements alive with running men like ants over a tree trunk, all rushing to the gatehouses-

Where the clamor was coming from. Of death and battle. 

"Sandor..."

Bolton's head twisted quickly back to Sansa, wide eyes making his pale pupils all the more unearthly. Then they narrowed in comprehension and he showed his teeth, implacable and inhuman mask burning away. The leeches had not taken all the feeling from him, and when he gripped his sword and snarled, his words were choked with hatred.

"Treachery. To the castle! Now!"

His sword sang in the air, a slash of silver between them, and then Jonelle's ax was swinging, horses heaved and whinnied and all was gnashing teeth and lunging bodies and shouts and pain. Through it all she saw the rude banner they had fashioned for Sansa, swinging low between them, as if the direwolf emblazoned on it would tear the Leech Lord's head off.

 

**SANDOR**

It was the silence and the waiting that gnawed at them worst. Too long without any distraction, enough time for the mind to detail all the myriad of ways they could fall into The Stranger's arms. Only when they were in motion did the feeling cease, and Sandor was grateful for the diversion of his thoughts. 

His odd little group had marched with Niall and he at their head, around the snow-covered hill until the boy stopped and pointed at a particular drift that looked like a white wall that had been hit by a trebuchet ball. Dented and bent inward, a few minutes digging uncovered the opening to the cave, a yawning black mouth seeking to swallow them down into the earth. Stannis had been there to see them off, though Sandor scowled at his company.

The Greyjoy children. The boy he barely recognized as Theon, eyes always wet, and his sister, who struck him as the wolfgirl Arya only far further down her bloody path. Asha, she was called.

"What're they doing here?"

"They wished to help you," Stannis said, as if that was enough. "Theon knows Winterfell, and something of the forces therein. Asha wants to help her brother, but she'll be staying here."

That wasn't what the girl was expecting, and her grim facade cracked to confusion and outrage as she sputtered, "But you said that-that-"

"I _said_ I found your request interesting," Stannis said smoothly, the tone of a man who did not _have_ to do anything, especially not for the children of his enemies. "Not that I _agreed_ to it." His eyes fixed on Theon instead, words that followed etched into unknowable stone, yet beyond doubt. "She is your sister, Theon, and you care for her. So know that if you attempt betrayal against me like you did Robb Stark, your sister's head will be forfeit before the sun sets. Do you understand?"

The boy seemed to, but Sandor _definitely_ did, and felt a grudging swell of appreciation for the harsh king. He wanted Theon's knowledge, and even gave the boy a chance to redeem himself... but he wasn't letting him _completely_ off the leash. His sister was his insurance, and Sandor had no illusions about Stannis making good on his... no, not a threat. A promise. Certain as act and reaction. 

"Alright," he rumbled, nodding at the cave entrance. "Light torches and follow the boy..."

They did just that, forgetting the night and the moon as they plunged into a darkness that had nothing to do with the cycle of the sky. This was the night eternal, where light never shone save that you brought with you and strange, glowing things wriggled and pulsed in cracks and around roots. The tunnel was not man-made; the ground had cracked in the long past and a twisting, uneven passage was formed there. Sandor had to bend over almost double for half the journey, and his men could only walk single file for the other half. Finally Niall halted, torch in hand, studying a patch of the wall... and then putting his arm all the way through it.

He motioned for silence and Sandor growled behind him for the same. Dozens of whispering mouths quieted along with shuffling feet as Niall put his head to the opening... listened carefully...

"Nothing," he whispered eventually, nodding with sweat shining on his face. "Alright, picks and axes..."

It was slow, agonizingly so, and for good reason. The tunnel was so cramped that they couldn't give full swing to their tools, and thus it took twice as long to smash and batter a doorway through the tunnel wall and into the crypt. Every swing came with ringing silence after it; every crack of iron on stone sounded like the boom of a great earthly bell, sure to bring hundreds howling down on them...

Every time, all of them froze. Listened. Swung again. Froze... listened...

Sandor didn't know how much time passed, but when it did, they were stepping from rock carved by nature into the sculpted resting place of the Starks. He was the first man ducking into the crypt, casting his torch around to see tombs so old and weathered that the writing on them was more like Old Tongue runes than Common. He'd seen tombs before, in Casterly Rock; vast and ornate things of marble and onyx, inlaid with gold and other soft, precious metals. But down here, at the furthest depths of Winterfell, were simple squares of granite and limestone, each one weighing tons, and inside each were the bones of a Stark. Sandor cast his eyes about the tunnel through the flickering torchlight. No more lights down there, no sign of life, in either sight or sound...

After a moment, he believed they were alone, and one by one, the unseen invaders of Winterfell began to breach its defences. 

"Douse those torches."

Sandor wasn't about to take chances so close to their goal. They moved by touch through the inky darkness, each man grasping the shoulder of the man ahead of him, Niall serving as the hesitant head of their snake. The boy shuffled forward, taking care with each step, even though-

"Ooof! Sorry, sorry... thank you, Clegane."

"Mind yer feet next time, boy."

The subterranean graveyard reversed in age the further they walked. By the brush of his hands, Sandor could tell the stonework of the tombs was improving. Not so much smoother, but the detail... he could make out the grooves and contours of hands and limbs and faces as he passed. The sigh of steel under his fingertips, and he realised there were actual longswords in those stony hands. Light glowed ahead of them and Niall rasped over his shoulder.

"We're close to the top of the crypt. It's long, and narrow, and then there's a staircase with a heavy iron door at the top."

"Where does it open to?"

"A small building, like a sept, but older, shorter. Opposite the First Keep you could see from outside, across a courtyard. On the other side shoulder... should be a doorway to another courtyard. A smaller one. Beyond that is the first gatehouse, and across the drawbridge is the outer one."

Sandor nodded in the darkness, thought Niall probably could not see it. The boy was dragging the words from memories he never thought he'd need, but were now so crucial. He turned back and found the slight, maimed form of Greyjoy behind him, clutching a short sword to his chest like a babe. 

"Wanna add anything, Greyjoy?"

"It is as-as he said," the boy said in his erratic, unsure lilt, slobbering over odd letters with his mouth scourged of half his teeth, long before age should have taken them. "B-But gatehouses, they'll have guards. L-Lots of guards. W-We have to g-get in them, f-fast. R-Run across c-courtyards. A-And n-no sure thing they'll be-be empty."

Sandor took that in stride, also. According to Stannis, Kamber, Theon and all else they'd scraped together, Bolton had four thousand sure men under his command. Most would be on the walls, the gatehouses, the weak spots to every castle. How many would or could be packed into those towers straddling the gates, though... that was different. Surprise and speed and bloody slaughter, that was what Sandor was relying on.

_Not just you. Them. The boy. Greyjoy. Stannis. Her._

He snorted like damn Stranger himself and killed the image of her in his eyes. No. Nothing of her would he carry that day, not in his mind, anyway. Her ribbon was wrapped around his wrist, an incongruous splash of lively color against the dull black of his armor, and that would be enough. Sandor was made and forged and lived for war and killing. He'd need all of that purpose, all of his years accumulated and pressed into one wild, mad hour and desperate, singular objective.

_Open the gates. Raise the portcullis. Lower the drawbridge. Keep them open until the rest can arrive._

_Even if that means all of you die._

Her face again. Begging him not to die. Sandor felt his lungs tighten as he thought of spilling his words to her, and the fact he didn't. He didn't want to die. Not anymore. Not with someone like her waiting for him, as he had always envied those men with sweethearts giving them will to survive past their orders and vows. Now he had the same and-

"Clegane? Clegane, do you hear him?"

"Anyone down here?"

"I... er, no, I think not. Everyone thinks the crypt is just a big hole in the ground filled with dead Starks. They don't know about the hole to the cave."

"What about the man you dealt with?"

"I don't think Jared's here anymore. Last I saw of him, he'd fled to White Harbor, with his cousins."

Jared. So that was the name he'd refused to give, that night in the longhall. Sandor looked upon Niall with fresh and almost humbled eyes when he heard that. He'd been unwilling to share that with the highborns, the sers, even His Lady, but Sandor? He trusted that man enough. Sandor nodded and gripped his shoulder. 

"Alright... stay behind me... and pull that sword, boy. You may need it."

He didn't, as it turned out, and Sandor felt a pang of disappointment that their plan was, well, _working_. The beast was growling and padding around his soul, claws striking sparks on the inside of his armor, but he kept it at bay. Plenty of time for it to feed. Plenty of chances once they opened that iron-ribbed door, at the top of the winding staircase.

Sandor put his ear to it and heard the sleepy sounds of a castle at rest beyond it. Voices languid and choked with exhaustion. The chilly air whistling under it. Distant laughter, drunken and uncaring. He peered between the double doors... and saw nothing but a stone wall beyond it, then a flash of movement-

-jerked his head away and held his breath, footsteps marching on, oblivious...

"We're here," he whispered. "Everyone back down the stairs, get what sleep you can in the crypt. We'll take shifts keeping watch. That door opens, we'll hear it from down there well enough. Have to listen close, too, for when the morning comes."

"How will you know?"

"Men shouting. Highborns kicking arses out of beds and into order. Trust me, lad: I know what that sounds like."

Thus it began, their slow, self-imposed torture in the darkness. Most of his three-score tried to sleep, using the final peace of lords and ladies as pillows and mattresses. Others toyed with their weapons or spoke, heads bowed close so not to make any noise. Sandor did not sleep. He knew it was useless to try. He knew the full breadth of what awaited them come the morning. The price of victory and the cost of defeat. 

Niall slept next to him, fitfully but at least he got some. More than once he'd jerked awake, breaking free from harsh dreams and finding Sandor's nightmare face waiting for him. But there was no fear when he saw it, surprising the big warrior. Just a reassurance... and then he patted the hilt of his new sword and smiled. Sandor even smiled back. 

Theon did not sleep. He rocked back and forth, lips moving softly, silently, speaking and arguing and pleading with ghosts. Sandor ignored him, until-

Muted shouts from above. A rooster's crowing, and Sandor thought only that _he_ wouldn't last too long around thousands of hungry men. 

The beast stirred him, and gripped his sword through his fingers. The morning had come. Their dance with The Stranger was set to commence, and already he could hear the music...

"Mark me well," he said, voice louder now so all could hear. Dozens of eyes were glinting at him from further back in the crypt, the mountain men unlimbering their weapons, axes and swords and a few bows. Their greatswords and staffs had been left behind, no use in the tight hallways. "Half of you... this half, by this wall, will follow me, and go to the first gatehouse, on the inner wall. We move fast, get in the doors and bar them from inside. Then we _hold them_ , as long as we can, and get the gates open and the drawbridge lowered. The other half, on this wall... you follow Niall and the Greyjoy."

That drew a murmur from all and popping eyes from the mentioned boys, but Sandor plowed on with one hand raised.

"Enough, damn you, just _listen_! They know better how to get to the outer gatehouse! Once the drawbridge is lowered, they'll haul their arses across it, get inside and do the same. This battle... it's going to be decided by us, boys, and you fucking know it. We get the North Gate open, and they see it, the Manderly knights will pour through the hole, give us a foothold, and then the rest of you mangy mountain sods will follow." A wry chuckle of laughter. _A fuck-faced southron, mayhap, but a funny cunt_ , they all seemed to think. "Might be we die giving them that time. Mayhap most of us. All of us. But here we are, and that's our task."

Sandor was never one for drama or theatrics. He'd always followed, not led, and his encouragement when he did was limited to threats. But looking at the faces of those men, many of whom he knew would die that day, he saw the light of conviction and... faith. Trust. It scared him but when he closed his eyes and drew his swords...

No. He couldn't banish her. Even as the beast snarled and his blood throbbed harder through his veins, Sansa was in his eyes. Giving him strength and giving him words. Sandor had seen fear and blind loyalty give men the strength and madness to cast off the will to live... but now, he understood something greater.

Loyalty. Devotion. Love. Those would drive a man not just to fight, but to give his life and give gladly for the sake of another. 

He drew his sword and dirk, shorter weapons fit for the narrow confines they'd soon be in. He raised them both for all to see, as if in salute to the dead in their stone beds and the living soon to join them.

"Now who follows me, and the Lady Stark, and who stays in shame and shadow?"

All followed. None stayed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [This](http://awoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/Armament) was a great source for all the weapon and armor Intel I needed, though the net is of course clogged with similar sites. Just in case anyone else needs it!
> 
> Now, to echo the feelings of my more rabid readers, in the words of my hallowed peers and ancestor, "COME UN' 'AVE A GO IF YA FINK YER 'ARD ENUF!" 
> 
> *charges off with Sandor*


	29. Chapter 29

**NIALL**

_They never sing about wanting to shit yourself, the lying bastards._

Niall could have laughed at the distinctly unheroic voice in his head, if his throat wasn't too dry to do anything but force handfuls of air down to his lungs. He stood in Sandor's shadow at the side of the doors to the crypt, listening to... more than _just_ a little commotion. It seemed like an army was running laps in the hallway outside the crypt, endless parades of boots, rushing here and there. Shouts and cries and curses and bellows from above them. A castle in uproar.

He licked his lips to wet them, but there was nothing. They'd drank their water earlier that morning, and Niall wasn't expecting to run out of moisture so fast.

_They never sing about the hero wanting to hide in a hole because he doesn't want to die._

"Looks like The Ned's girl's made 'er appearance," said one of the clansmen in a rough rasp, clothed entirely in furs and skins, more wildling than Northerner, utterly out of place in the sprawling stonework of Winterfell. "We go now?"

"Not yet," said Sandor. "Give it a few minutes until-"

Then they heard it. The creaking, stuttering clank of chains. The groan of tons of wood, then the crash as it smacked flat across the moat. Horses pounding over it, beating out a mad, urgent drumbeat. Sandor frowned so deep his eyes nearly vanished, pausing so long that Niall was about to question him when-

"Someone's gone out to parlay with 'em," he said, almost in wonder. "I thought they'd just... shout down from the walls. But he fucking well sent someone out in person. Arrogant bastard."

"The gates are open? The drawbridge down?"

"Aye, should be, but don't count on 'em _staying_ that way once we get out there," Sandor said, readying his weapons a second time while he spoke. Niall gulped dust and terror and hefted his bastard sword with both hands. It was so light for such a long blade, and Niall knew... it was for a warrior. A knight. But Sandor had given it to him, the bloody fool. "Fuckin' Bolton'll slam 'em shut again once he sees one of his gates under siege and a sodding army peltin' towards it. Still..."

He snorted, laugh gleaming and predatory in the knife slash of light falling across his face from the crack in the door. Niall thought he looked like some maimed wolf with his shaggy black hair, uncut for weeks now and hanging down past his shoulders. 

"Half our job done. Boy, are y'ready?"

Niall hesitated but managed a jerky nod of his head. Sandor grasped his shoulder and lowered his voice a touch, tone of it the same as when he gifted that blade to him. 

"You know what yer doing?"

_They never sing about imagining your guts hanging out and you trying to shove them back in. Or your eyes bugging out your head and your face turning purple when they hang you, 'cause prisoners eat too much._

"Ay-Aye."

"Tell me."

"F... Follow you wi... with half the men." _Breath in. Breath out. Talk_ _. S'all he wants right now: just words._ "You take the inner house. We go across the bridge, get into the outer one, and do the same as you." Sandor opened his mouth but Niall was already answering. "Which is hold the doors, keep the gates open until the rest can get into the castle."

Sandor nodded, satisfied but with a glint in his eyes. Apprehensive. Doubting. Niall felt himself shrivelling like rotten grass under the sun of his stare. He couldn't do this. Thirty clansmen storming a tower of storm, packed with Dreadfort men. He didn't count himself, or Theon. He wasn't a warrior, or a knight, or even a sodding soldier. He hadn't gotten into a fight since he was four and ten, for fuck's sake! Niall felt a tremble in his hand and strong, formless claws from inside his guts pull him down into the darkness of the crypt, never to look upon Sandor again for his shame-

"Remember what I taught you, lad." Sandor spoke and Niall looked up, just in time to see the big man grasp his shoulder, squeeze hard. "Know it wasn't much, but it's what I had time for. Stick with the Greyjoy. Watch him. Y'won't be alone up there. Don't just watch yer own arse; watch _theirs_ too. Don't waste time with _anything_ like fair fighting and Niall? This ain't the day for mercy. You won't get any, so don't show any. Put yer man down _fast and sure_ and move on."

Niall was on a tightrope and no-one else could see the fall. The strongest, bravest man he knew was trying to talk him up, but still he wanted to flee. Shame. Guilt. Gods, how had he not worked that out before that morning? That was what kept soldiers in formation on the battlefield. Fuck loyalty and honor and even plunder. The thought of having to face your mates again after leaving them to die... that would make a man stand firm with a broken stick against heavy cavalry. But it wasn't enough-

"Yer a brave lad, Niall," Sandor murmured, and Niall gaped. "Don't do something stupid and get killed." He leaned forward, so close that Niall could see ever gash and cruel groove of his scars, and the smile on his lips. "She'd never let me hear the end of it."

That got a laugh out of him. Dry as Dorne, but a laugh none the less. One last moment of... something. Something other than the mad horror that would follow. He nodded and felt the weights on his feet slide away; the talons in his guts vanished. He hefted his sword and remembered: parry, cut, binden, thrust, riposte... use the hilt as well as the blade... come to that, use your _fists and feet_ , too... mind your footwork and if all else fails, back away and try again. 

"Ready?"

"No," Niall said truthfully, then followed it with a shrug. "But let's go anyway, aye?"

Sandor grinned for the last time, and Niall saw flames in his eyes, like burning mist. "Good enough for me, lad."

Then the big man reared back and kicked the doors dead in the center, heavy hunks of wood that would take a man each to heave open and with his strength they flew away from each other like the doors to a chicken coop. Sandor was out and swinging before they'd even cracked into the walls behind them, and Niall saw a couple of Dreadfort men freeze in shock-

-right before Sandor bellowed like a charging bull and slashed down at one, opening his chest up like he was a side of cooked beef-

-slamming his dirk so hard into the stomach of the man next to him that it lifted him off his feet, blood spurting down his hand and pattering on the ground-

-then he pulled it away and he was off, a rushing god of war cleaving through the stunned men-at-arms hurrying through the courtyard.

Niall was right behind him. The gatehouse loomed ahead of them, and it was yawning wide, the oak gates inlaid with cast iron thrown aside, the drawbridge down, all the way through the outer gate... and if he squinted, he could see the handful of little smudges sitting on big smudges with swishing tails. The parlay underway, a flag of truce and negotiation...

 _Fuck fighting fair_ , Sandor had told him once. Niall was inclined to agree, but _this_... even he knew it stank of low tactics.

Then he remembered _whom_ they were fighting, and thought on his guilt no longer.

"MOVE, YOU STUNTY NORTHERN BASTARDS!" The big Westerlander roared, a whirling tower of death and steel that splattered blood with every stroke, stunned Bolton men falling back from him in horror. "THINK I'MMA WIN THIS FUCKING BATTLE FOR YOU?!"

The clansmen yelled a wordless answer to his challenge. Niall roared with them, and then they were pouring out of the crypt, like the ghosts of primitives given flesh and hurtling from the afterlife back to the real, bent on claiming vengeance over their desecrators. Axes and swords and maces were slashing and hacking at everything that wasn't in fur and skins, and soon the courtyard was littered with corpses and dying men and hands and feet and brown-white dirt had turned to blackish red. Greyjoy was running ahead and Niall stayed at his side, eyes lost in the whirl, then-

-someone wearing the colors of a house he couldn't name charged at him with an ax and Niall swayed back, letting it swing past him, through the air his neck would have been-

-then thrust just like Sandor had shown him, bastard sword going from cocked at his side to stabbing forward through the air-

-jamming into the man's chest and Niall forced himself to grip tighter, push harder-

That first moment of resistance ended in just as much time. Like pushing a knife through soft fruit with a hard skin, the bastard slid through fat and flesh and guts and scraped bone in a way that sent little tremors through Niall's hand, and he kept pushing and pushing until the two of them were chest to chest and nearly embracing.

The boy gasped blood onto his face. His eyes were wide and rage had been replaced by piteous, mortal pleading. He didn't want to die, either, and now there was nothing else he would do. Niall panted and pulled the bastard free, smacking away a blood-slick hand grasping for his shoulder, using his free hand to shove the boy to one side.

Not much older than you. Barely even shaving. 

_They don't sing about how old they are when you kill them. Not grizzled old bastards with beards and lives already lived. Just boys. Scared boys who believe-_

Men like Sandor, he supposed, and he forgets the damn brat who _tried to cut his fucking head off with an ax_. Clegane certainly had no doubts or hesitations, a tireless explosion of movement that didn't seem to slow or stop, lashing out with boot and steel-clad fist when his blades were otherwise engaged, kicking open the door to the inner gatehouse.

"With me!" Niall shouted, raising his blood-drenched bastard and feeling hot wetness drip onto his head. "Across the bridge!"

He knew arrows would dog their feet, and some men would die and fall on that ice below them. He knew there would be men waiting for them in the gatehouse, and they would have time to line up, shield themselves, level spears and bikes and crossbows at the doors...

But still he ran, screaming with his eyes wide and terrified and mad and it was Sandor's grin and grip that spurred him onward. He saw Theon running and limping next to him, eyes alive with a stark, hungry desperation. Just before they passed under the portcullis he saw a flash of black armor splattered with glowing liquid and Sandor was-

 

**SANDOR**

_-gorging, glutted, supping, savoring, drinking, slaking, fucking yes-YES- **YES SEND ME MORE!**_

_i'm whirling and slicing and cutting and we're dancing, the two of us,it has been so long. sword and dirk are rising and falling and parrying in my hands and men fall away from me clutching their faces or guts or the stumps where their hands used to be._

_a whole castle of meat. that's all they are after the first half-dozen fall and the taste is in my mouth and I have to shake the bone and bile from my hair. the beast is roaring and laughing and he sounds like ever man i hate and everything i've caged too long._

_i don't even know if my men are behind me, and i don't care. the courtyard is a butcher's yard by the time i cross it; i'm a tornado made steel and my path is blood and bleeding and twitch corpses._

_but i am not alone. i'm at the door and look back and-_

The boy does well, for his first. Same look of... surprise, that I remember. That it could really be so easy to snuff out a life. _It shouldn't_ , I can see him thinking, _but it is. See?_ He slides the corpse off and... he keeps moving. He doesn't vomit and he doesn't cry because he still has a job to do. A mission to accomplish.

My lips stretch under sweat and blood and dirt, and it's not the beast smiling. He doesn't feel pride. Doesn't feel anything except hunger. But I don't let him go without for long-

_one-two kicks are all i need and the iron-backed door is hanging off one hinge and i'm hacking through the air behind the still-swinging ruin. dark figures in dreadfort cloaks, holding shortspear and mace, stabbing out at me and my dirk stabs at stomachs and writhing, stinking things slide from ragged holes onto the stone-_

_men scream and i finish them where practical, or leave them for those following. woolly half-human bastard clansmen, following the big southron cunt through the slaughterhouse. now my iron-shod boots are pounding up the stairs and my hearts shuddering with every step-_

_-shield coming around at me, curling around the winding stairs. blocking my view but i know it's coming, the sword thrusting towards the invader-_

_-i knock it aside and thrust back, but the shield stops it and i scream something and drop my dirk, grab the edge of it-_

_-heave so hard forwards the little bastard holding it goes flying past me and into the wall of the tower-_

_-put my bastard through his back until it pokes out his stomach, then leave him. keep climbing, running, deaf to the calls of betrayal and confusion and dying all around. soon the castle will be alive and flooding towards the north gate and that's fucking fine, that's-_

_"fuckin' 'ave a go, then?!"_

_optimistic wanker outside the door to the windlass chamber, great wooden wheels with chains and ropes attached to it snatched from view as men inside slammed the door. wanker has a with a couple of friends. first one comes at me from the side with a short sword and i parry, grab him by the collar and shatter his nose with my forehead-_

_-fling him into his charging friend, knock them both down-_

_-jump over their flailing bodies with a yell and take the third's arm off when he thrusts for my stomach-_

_"CUNT!"_

_one of them slices at the back of my leg and i go down to one knee, hammering down with my metal fist as I do, and smash what's left of his nose into his brain. the last one's still trying to get out from under him and i stab down at his heart-_

_-so hard it scrapes and screeches against bone as it bursts out his back. he coughs and sputters and i twist it, getting up and ignoring his frothing babble. fucking useless. no fucking sport. clansmen are hovering around me, wielding picks and axes and battering down the windlass door and i hear-_

_men shouting. a highborn voice. screaming out the window at..._

_bolton. fucking went out to the parlay with-_

Sansa. They won't raise the drawbridge without him inside, but that only gives us moments. The clansmen are ripping chunks out of the door like they're hacking down pine trees back home, but it's not fast enough. I can hear hooves, fast approaching, and at the staircase-

_more voices. more screams. clansmen dying, dreadfort dying, all dying, fuck them. i'm **not**. my northern bastards split between battering down the door and forming behind me, facing the doorway to the stairs and the windy opening to the battlements. bolton's northern bastards are rushing up both and i fill my hand with a fat, spiked mace from a dead man's just as they come and-_

_"BASTARDS!"_

_i bellow with the beast and blood flies from my mouth and it isn't all mine and my first swing-_

**SANSA**

"-took my damn fingers off!"

Even in that horrid, bloody moment after The Stranger had danced so close to her, Sansa found a broken moment to marvel at Jonelle's highborn restraint. The woman was awkwardly trying to keep hold of her reins and her ax while she kept her other hand clasped tight under her armpit, face white and bloodless from pain. She'd left two fingers in the frozen mud behind them, stiffening along with a scattering of still or writhing Dreadfort soldiers.

"Jonelle, give me the ax-"

"I'm f-"

"Don't even _think_ of finishing that sentence!" Sansa snapped and gasped even as she said it, but still snatched the ax away from the woman and nearly toppled over from the weight of it. "Your hand-"

" _Fingers_ , girl, not so bad-"

"Lady Jonelle, are you-"

"No, I am _not_ , Lord Wylis!" Jonelle held up the red ruin of her hand, missing two fingers with a third nearly severed. "But I feel much improved from ending that... that-"

"Forward!" Stannis cried ahead of them, shouting over their horses and the rushing wind and Sansa could see a ripple of movement from the Manderly horsemen become an avalanche. "Strike now! Follow _me_ and strike _now!_ "

The earth quaked as if giants were waking under their feet, and with a single roar from five hundred throats, the knights and mounted men of White Harbor were breaking horseshoes to follow their chosen king. Sansa watched entranced, thinking that Stannis Baratheon was hardly what a maiden thought of when she imagined a shining hero, but there he was-

_Leading an army of brave men, with Lords Wylis and Umber at his side, charging the gate of Winterfell._

"COME 'EAD, YA BASTARDS!"

_That part of the song will probably be left out, too._

Young Flint was waving her banner from atop his horse, standing bolt upright in the stirrups, arms pumping and gleaming with sweat even with the cold. The mountain men were already running through the snow towards the gate, a vast herd of armed bears, howling and pledging to the Old Gods as they raced for that tiny entrance. Flint shook his head and an arc of red hissed into the snow. He'd nearly lost an eye, and because of Sansa. 

The memory was so fresh that she was sure it was unfolding all over again when she pictured it. Roose and his guards unsheathing their swords, intent on murder in payment for betrayal. Stannis... gods, she'd heard he was a hard man, but she'd not seen tell of his skill as a warrior. It was hard to imagine, seeing his dour, stiff form grumble about his rights and his duties. 

He'd killed one of the Dreadfort men before he could even raise his sword, then he was engaging another, swords crashing and clanging and striking sparks even in the frigid air. 

Wylis was likewise deceptive as his father. Just another fat man, she was sure they all thought, and with the speed to match a dying slug. But in a pair of blinks Wylis had his broadsword free and had spurred his horse straight forward, laying about himself and Sansa felt warmth splash across her dress, soaking through her-

Roose grunted, as if that were all his withered, lifeless self could conjure in place of a scream. Jonelle shrieked and Sansa saw little sausages sailing through the air-

He'd swung for her. He'd tried to kill her, eyes like steaming ice suddenly alive with the stinking, staggering contempt he so carefully hid. Jonelle got in the way, batting away his sword with her ax and then swinging for him, but he was too fast, too hardened by war and killing, struck out at her-

-would have taken her hand off, but then the great direwolf of House Stark was swooping down among them, folds of cloth blinding them all, throwing Roose off.

"YEH DOSS CUNTS, YEH!"

Young Flint was making his father proud, Sansa was sure of that. She'd had to sweet talk him into being her bannerman, her and Jonelle, telling him how he'd have the honor of holding The Ned's colors once again. Flint had just glared at the pony they'd picked for him, a placid little creature that he nonetheless regarded as if it had earlier attempted to bite his manhood off. Then their parlay went to the hells and he had no time to get his sword and he struck back with all he had.

Which happened to be a six-foot oaken pole, so it could have been worse. 

One of the Dreadfort men yelped and toppled from his steed, half his head cracked, blood blinding him and leaking down his face. Lord Umber was hollering like a wounded bear, which he suddenly was, hewn in three places by Bolton steel and still hacking and slashing with his ax, smashing it into a horse's head and trapping the rider under it, lopping another man's leg off in the stirrup. 

Roose ran and left his men to die. They surged forward to protect their liege and he jerked his horse around so hard its gums were pierced and spurred it hard towards the North gate. All the while... Sansa just sat there. Horse shying and whinnying under her, face frozen as her limbs, so... useless-

"Lady?!"

Flint's voice snapped through her shock, just a moment too late. Strong hands were gripping her leg and the broken-headed Dreadfort man was clutching at her, one good eye wild and hateful, pulling a dirk from his belt, determined at his end to do as much fucking damage as he could. She looked into his face and saw a man who would kill her, and finally she could-

-reach around her back to Sandor's dagger, bring it up high-

"Bitch!"

But she was too slow. He reached up and groped for her arm, and she was scared, she couldn't... damnit, she could find anywhere to stab! Not with his hands and his dagger waving in front of her and she felt tears of rage and anger sprout from her face-

"DIE!"

She was sure she would. She couldn't stop it. Sandor was not there to protect her, and for all her talk, it was her who would fail him now. Even with a dagger in her hand she couldn't use it, barely knew how. Gods, she was so...

Alive?

The Dreadfort man blinked, then his gaze slide to his side... and seemed to note for the first time the Lady Jonelle's ax biting deep into the side of his neck. The noblewoman was panting hard enough for a torrent of steam to issue forth whenever she did, one hand a mangled mess, the other gripping her ax tight and with a yell she ripped it free-

More blood. Spraying and arcing and Sansa was back in her nightmare, bathed and stained forever with the life of another man.

It was warm. It was horrible. But when he fell back and gurgled his last, Sansa looked down at her hands... and knew it would wash away. It was just blood. It would not whisper to her or cloy at her, and his corpse would not rise again and haunt her dreams. She looked down at the bloodstained dagger in a likewise hand, though she'd no part in his death. 

 _Only a matter of time_ , some part of her cautioned. _This is the world you live in. Sandor was only half-right about that: more than just men need be killers._

Sansa shuddered at the thought and turned her mind to Jonelle. Around them, the Dreadfort men begged or writhed or died, and she barely noticed. Bolton men. Monsters. Beasts. She cared only to rip a length of her banner from where it fluttered above her, wrapping it around Jonelle's hand tight-

"Graaaaaahh... damnit, Sansa?!"

"You'd prefer to bleed to death?!"

"No... No, I would not." Riders galloped past her, Lord Umber joining them as he spat blood and curses, heedless to his wounds. Young Flint stayed by Sansa's side, but every fiber of him was yearning to tear across the half-league and rush through the gate with his approaching kin. That same look was in Jonelle's eyes. "And I would not miss this day either."

"Jonelle, your hand-"

"I didn't come this far to _stand aside!_ " Jonelle snarled, and finally her restraint slipped and Sansa could see the raging grief beneath her mask. "I will _not_ have it said that I just _watched_ as the Boltons were brought to heel, while my family's killers were-"

"Jonelle?!"

Sansa gripped her tight. The woman was fierce and she trained with her weapon... but was not the warrior she thought she was. She had not tasted true battle, the madness of it, the chaos and death that could strike from every turn. Her three sworn shields were already galloping to her but even they were only a trio against hundreds... and still her life was leaking from her hand. Sansa knew a wound like that could easily turn rotten, and who would be left to watch over Castle Cerwyn?

"You are the _last_ Cerwyn, Jonelle," she said, words hard and loaded with the tradition and bloated importance they both despised. But now, it was true... and useful to her. "Your people, your _brother and father_ , would want you to _live_ in the North you helped make today. Not die _pointlessly_ with some lowborn Dreadfort man's spear in your belly!"

"And would you?" Jonelle shot back right away, the world shrinking to just the two of them, glaring at each other across a short, chilly distance. "If your father's killer were in there, your brother's murderer-"

"He _is_ in there!"

She shrieked her answer and it came without tears. Damn it, she had cried enough; a river, an _ocean_ of grief and it brought _no-one_ back. Sansa had lost herself to that sorrow before, and a smiling snake had been there to remold her shattered soul into something horrible. Something she barely recognized. She would not make that mistake again, letting her anger chase her to death. She glared hard at the noble woman with eyes made old by all she had suffered.

"And we will see justice done, for both of us, but you will be here to see it, Jonelle. I can barely use this damn dagger... and you know full well you cannot fight a siege with only one hand." She softened, reached out to fold her sticky fingers around the white knuckles clutching the Cerwyn weapon. "Please. Don't..." She clutched tighter. "Don't add your own corpse to all the rest."

Jonelle's chest heaved, and blood seeped from her hand like sand from an hourglass. Even moving her arm twisted her face into a rictus of pain, and she knew... damn it, she knew the girl was right. Her head slumped with her shoulders, defeated, as her shields reined in their mounts at her side, Salton already ripping a dressing from his saddle bag. 

"Aye..." She whispered. "I won't... but methinks there will be plenty come the end of this..."

The ladies Cerwyn and Stark turned to the stone walls and towers of Winterfell, and the sounds clamoring forth spoke of some vast beast warring with itself, as countless tiny figures of metal and flesh hurled themselves at one another, all of them knowing victory or death were their only paths that day.

Sansa swallowed and turned not away, as if if she did somehow she would see one man amidst thousands, and in doing, could keep him alive.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really hated the ending of this. Lemme know what ya think, and as always, thanks for reading, you beautiful beans, you...!


	30. Chapter 30

**ROOSE**

Treachery. The one thing I never thought they'd have the wit for. 

I curse myself as Ebon chews up the ground between the site of the parlay - _distraction_ , more like - and the chaos at the gate becomes clearer. No sounds follow me, save the dwindling cries for aid and mercy. My escort did not survive with me, then. No matter. They served their purpose, and mayhap were useful enough to drag a couple of their killers to the afterlife with them. 

Sansa Stark. A girl. A _waif_ , fit for nothing but her name and her womb, but even she had escaped my blade, thanks to Lady Cerwyn. A moment slower, and the deed could have been done. Another troublesome Stark dead at my hand. 

Jonelle. Now a few fingers lighter. I'm already looking forward to showing her the rest of what I cut off when we have our reckoning.

But that is the future: the present is writ large before me in steel and blood. Dreadfort and stout, ragged clansmen from the Wolfswood, bludgeoning and hacking at each other... concentrated at the doors to the gatehouses, my men struggling to keep back the hordes. But how did they get inside the castle? No matter now. The gates. The drawbridge. End this incursion, swamp them with my men, and slam the ways shut once more. 

I reach the looming outer gatehouse and see... yes, Theon Greyjoy. As was. The callow, smirking youth I knew had long-since been replaced by my bastard's pet, but this vision of him was thrusting and slashing and parrying with a shortsword, eyes still wide and fearful. Yet still, he fought. He'd escaped this place days before and I dismissed him as dead, along with the false Stark girl. But now he was back and... yes... he must have been the one. Some secret way into the castle. Seeking redemption, most likely. 

How heroic.

He turns to me just in time to see my sword come down. He jerks his sword up too late and it's weak, trembling under me, parting-

Metal gives way to cloth and flesh and I feel the last tear and rend under me. His eyes pop and he staggers, blood oozing and spraying and coursing out his chest. The clansmen around him are drawn to me, horse setting me apart, faces twisted in fury, and I ride on. I am alone, and cannot affect this outcome. But further down...

I spy the inner gatehouse. No clansmen outside, but my men are crowding into the doors and up the stairs, shoving and pushing each other in their eagerness. I care not if it's lust for blood or desire to redeem themselves in my eyes for their stupidity. As long as they do their damn duty and die usefully, it's all the same. 

I spur Ebon onwards, slashing around me, more to keep them away and stop them from crowding me than to strike precisely. Ebon neighs behind his bit, blood seeping through the leather cutting into his cheek. I hit him harder, the flat of my sword against his flank, drawing yet more blood. Damn useless creature. But he moves, bucking a little as he shoots across the drawbridge.

Cold, now. In my mind. Flush of anger and hate... too much like Ramsay. Like the Young Wolf. I need thoughts now, strategy, not mindless bloodlust. The outer gatehouse is still besieged, but the innter... there are no clansmen in the courtyard, no counting corpses. That means they are all inside, probably battering down the door to the chain above the gate and the bridge. If they can take that, and hold it, Stannis will have his entry. 

"Lord Bolton?!" A ragged Dreadfort man gasps up at me as I jerk Ebon to a halt and leap of him, knees creaking as I do. Old bones, but young enough to carry this damn day. "There are mayhap twenty of them, upstairs-"

"Twenty?" I snap back, mayhap the most animated the man has ever seen me. "A _score_ of men and yet you _hundreds_ cannot squash them in a _blink_?"

"They-They have a beast with them, my lord," the man stammers, eyes wide like a child told his first tale of Others and their ice spiders. "He-He is raining hellfire on us, and drinking blood, and none can-"

Almost apart from my own will, my hand lashes out and there's a crunch of breaking bone that echoes up my arm. The man whirls down to the ground spitting teeth and when he looks up, there is no second blow from my bloodied gauntlet. One was enough. Control... Control... I will need it. I cannot let it slip now.

"Take all the men you have-" I point behind me to the outer gatehouse, the clansmen still clamoring to get inside the doors, and behind them, the fast approaching tide of Manderly cavalry. "-and _hold_ that damn bridge. Pikeman to the front, crossbowmen behind, _now!_ "

He spits out blood and cracked bone and scurries away, gathering men, the ones who did not hear me, anyway. Word spreads fast, stoked by my obvious ire and I see fear flush on their faces. Fear of me, my Bastard, of my house and the room we always deny we have. Fear of their what their  _failure_ will surely birth.

Fear enough to give them speed and courage. But I will give them one thing more. 

"This beast is a _man_ ," I say loud enough for all to hear, forcing my way through the press to the door of the gatehouse, ripping off my cloak as I do. "Not a daemon from the hells. And when I take his head and throw him from the battlements, _you_ will know it, and _they_ will know they face the wrath of the _Flayed Men!_ "

A shaky cheer, but a cheer regardless. Prattling, mewling fools. Enough of them have already died and some corner of my mind is calculating the cost of replacing them. But now they have enough steel in their spines to follow me up the gatehouse, and Flayer fills my hand, broad and long and I feel the thrumming sensation quiver in my guts, quickening my legs and my breath. 

So long since I have been tested with steel, and what is life without The Stranger's breath in your ear? 

 

**STANNIS**

He cannot see how well the plan is working, but there's enough pandemonium around the Northern Gate to tell Stannis that Clegane's mad scheme is not dead yet. He's lived through a dozen battles and sieges, and knows enough to understand it can be nigh-impossible to fathom the swirling chaos that envelops them when you are nose-deep into the slaughter, which is exactly where they are riding. Most times they are simple meat grinders, and it's breaking of wills, forced by superior position or numbers or savagery, not inspired tactics and noble cause, that decides them. Stannis rides on implacably and his eyes are fixed on the gate, trying to discern something, anything-

_The bridge is down. The gates are open. That is all we need know._

But there is more to weather than just slowly draining minutes of opportunity. The battlements crawl with soldiers wielding wooden crosses, tipped with quarrels. First ragged and thin, then volleys of them, bolts that can stab through plate at a hundred feet with ease are loosed their way. Manderly men tumble from their mounts with thin screams, gurgles, sometimes nothing at all. Horses scream and collapse under others, a swift death compared to the unstoppable trampling their riders face. Stannis squints as if the rain of wood and sharp steel were a squall. He survived a sea of green flame and an endless sea of wildlings; he would survive a pack of Northern usurpers with-

Impact. So sharp and sudden the shock of it eclipses the agony, high in his arm. Stannis gasps and gnashes his teeth until he feels one of them crack. The bloody quarrel pierces his left bicep and already he can feel blood pump under his armor, soak his tunic, draining all sensation from the limb. Pain will come later, he knows, but for now the rush of sheer, defiant _life_ numbs him, beats back the pain. Still he grips the rein. Still he roars for his horse to go to, closer, closer-

Flashes in his eyes as he's the first man under the gateway.

Screaming and clashing steel from the murder holes above and to the sides.

Scattered, broken glimpses of boots and gauntlets and gleaming blades. 

Rushing men on the battlements, Dreadfort and clansmen, other houses, rushing to engage or holding fast, men falling from the walls.

The Greyjoy boy, or someone bearing his likeness hunched over in a doorway, deep and dying breaths bubbling red foam from his mouth and scarlet chest both. Clansmen are rushing past him for the stairs, one staying behind to press to the boy's chest. Hard. But he barely moves. 

 _Dead man,_ Stannis thinks, not caring to waste too long on a turncloak. _He got what he wanted._

Hooves and clanking armor and weapons echo like thunder belched from the earth around the stone archway. The Manderly horse are careening after him, every man they get through the entrance another advantage, but one impossible to press until they are through both gates. And the drawbridge is thick with Deadfort men, forming into a rough line, pikes leveled and behind them-

Stannis sees the bows. The men behind them. One eye closed, another open, aiming carefully at a minute distance. 

They are too few to matter against the surge of armored momentum riding hard against them; he knows that from experience. But he is on the front rank.

_Where a king should lead his men from._

Stannis points with his sword and lets his last cry to the world issue forth, ranks so close to him now that he can make out the tight, terrified expressions of the men he will kill, and will likely kill _him_. In the space of that final burst of sound, he sees more than just enemies. Peons. Smallfolk. He sees the red woman and what she showed him in the flames, what he _knows_ he saw there. He thinks of his wife. He thinks of his daughter, and some long-forgotten and tempered shred of him clenches tight until it shakes him. 

He thinks of Davos and Renly and Robert and Sansa Stark. The raven from the Wall and the tasks yet to be accomplished.

 _I do not die here_ , he thinks, and it is a thought set apart from his charging body and his bloody shoulder. It is certain as the stone around him and the death before him. _I am chosen of the Lord of Light._

Wind bites and screams echo and blood soaks his sleeve and the rein his senseless fingers grip. Still he charges, as taut springs twang and a mass of dark grey near to black explodes from the window of the windlass chamber above the inner gatehouse.

 

**SANDOR**

It never knows when to stop. Doesn't know that it **can** stop. I let it loose and it's howling in my ears louder than the men and boys we kill and it could do this forever, until the world is empty save for the two of us in one skin and an ocean of corpses. 

_block from the right, crack of it trembling down my arm-_

_-swing the mace down and to the side before it fades, feel a twitch in my cock as i his knee bone shatters and his leg bends at an angle no god intended-_

_-slice the sword across his throat as he screams, a fresh arc of scarlet, another coat on my face, coppery metal scarlet choking and feeding me-_

_-from the right, a spear, twist to the side and it thrust past me-_

_-backhand my bastard across the spearman's chest, lay it open, don't even watch as he falls-_

_-two in front, bastard and mace snapping, clanging, trembles turning to tremors, fingers numb and pained-_

I feel it. I've slaughtered more men until I can see no stone but only bodies, and still here's no fucking end to them. The staircase and the battlements keeps vomiting them up and every one that falls to me takes another shred of my strength. Getting fucking old. Leg screaming under me from the sword cut to it. Arm aching from that barely-healed elbow. A score of bruises and cuts I don't even remember but-

_still it's free and roaring with me until i'm sure i'll never speak again for the shouting, and the first bastard gets his face smashed through his brain with the mace and the other has the sword between his legs, me cutting up-_

_-he shrieks and wails and i kick him backward, knocking down a handful of others, so close together that they all fall like bottles stacked too close-_

_-a moment for me to scream over my shoulder:_

_"GET THAT FUCKING DOOR-"_

Open. The clansmen kick the ravaged wood apart, lock destroyed, hinges a mess, and the Dreadfort men inside rush them. Stocky little sods are good for a ruck, though, ducking or dodging and laying into them with their hand axes and short swords and daggers. Cunt with steel on his legs is bearing down on them, though, cutting one down and headbutting another.

More Bolton cunts manning the chains. Trying to pull the bridge up or frantically pulling on the chains to the gates.

A creaking groan from under me as they pull. The gate is closing. Stannis is charging across the bridge and ready to ram through their pikemen or die trying but if that gate closes-

_he still needs us and we are there. we care not, and we never have. he birthed us, he and his brother, and we have saved him countless times._

_wolf or kraken or stag or lion or fish or tower. wild or kingdom. small or high. crone or babe._

_we do not care, and we never have._

_he hates us and he loves us, for without us he is still that weak weeping boy. we made him strong. we gave the hound teeth._

_he calls us and-_

_i'm through the door, shoving aside my own men with a curse and the bolton men are wide-eyed as i scream at them, hands filled with levers and chains-_

_-they die with delicious wetness bursting from them, spinning down and painting the stone and wood-_

_-dripping through the murder holes. pouring. flowing. fumbling hands for ill-used steel below wide, begging eyes and they die quickly like animals but metal legs-_

_he curses and comes in strong, and sure, swinging at my head-_

_-and the mace blocks it, but he does the same for my bastard, kicking out between my legs-_

_-star explode and suns rise in my eyes and i stagger, legs shaking, wounded, tired, nearly spent, down on one knee again-_

_-he kicks again, looking to put me on my back, finish me there-_

_i let it roar. i let it take me and ruin me and rage past muscle and weakness and i see my sister's face and gregor's sneer and baelish and cersei and-_

Her. Weeping and broken. Because of me.

_i roar and lunge towards him off one foot, feeling muscles in there stretch and tear, but it's so unexpected all he can do is gape as i take him across the chest-_

_-bear him into the wall, drop the mace-_

_-snap my head up so hard that the back of it-_

_-cracks into his nose and his eyes glaze over, buying me a moment-_

_-to jam my thumb in his eye, other fingers splayed around the side of his head-_

_-push-_

_-squeeze-_

_-groan as the beast shudders in spastic ecstasy in me-_

_-as he screams and he claws without thought or idea-_

_-and i'm screaming and he's crying and then there's that wet thunk-thunk-thunk over over over as i smash his head against the wall until the back of his skull is a pulped mass of bone splinters and grey brains and he isn't doing anything but twitching-_

_i pull out my finger with a sickening sucking sound and he drops. the chains are unattended. the gate is open. the drawbridge is down. outside the dreadfort men are hammering away at the clansmen but the grim little fucks are fighting and dying standing, a handful pouring past me to brace against the door on the other side, because now it's their fucking turn to hold the room from the cunts on the other side-_

_screams. cries of "lord bolton". i look out the door, panting wet and choking, coughing-_

_a man as bloodless as a corpse in dark grey armor cleaves through the line of clansmen, face lifeless but eyes blazing like grey flames, marching towards me and his lips curl back just a touch, enough to show his teeth._

"Clegane."

I blink. A beat of recognition. 

"Bolton."

"You're already dead on your feet," he says, voice eerie, cool, conversational, and but for his eyes, you'd believe it. "So consider this a mercy-"

No questions as to why I'm there, what I'm doing. We both know that doesn't matter. He's fresh and I'm tired, he's unwounded and I'm battered, and he's been training same as me since he wasn't much older, survived wars and battles and sieges. I know how this ends.

The beast doesn't.

_dead cunt. good a name as any. not bolton, not lord, not fucking roose. looks fucking dead, gonna be fucking dead._

_but he's fast, and smooth. fucking white viper snapping out with his steel tongue, forcing me back, making me angry when he parries and blocks-_

_until i get under his guard and jam my shoulder into him, force him back-_

_-don't see his arms snap behind his back, know he's going to-_

_-pull something-_

_-try to stagger back, sword up-_

_a curved blade, strange little jutting point at the end of it. memories of hunts as a child, as a soldier, as a shield. that same blade sliding under fur and skin, wet and silky until the tearing sound of hide ripped from the clutching, stinking yellow fat and red muscle under it-_

_-now stabbing at my side-_

_-under my armpit-_

_i scream and the beast screams and for once we are united in pain. my right arm goes dead and the bastard trembles, about to fall-_

_he's on me again. surging forward, seeing my weakness, slashing with the bastard, i just about parry, but he slashes with the knife, confident-_

_-too much-_

_i throw up my arm and his forearm crashes into it, gauntlets grinding for a moment, our arms wide as we face each other._

_remember_

_we gave the hound **teeth**_

_and i see his eyes widen and that freezing calm shatter as i lunge, mouth open-_

_-and he's screaming into my mouth as my teeth latch onto his lower lip and nose. my jaw aches and burns until it's past pain and i'm still biting down, until nose rips away-_

_stab_

_over_

_over_

_my side_

_the beast-_

_pulls away and spits out gamey flesh and muscle and bolton's reeling back and staring at his hand and the blood covering it, feeling-_

_nothing. absence. teeth shining at me without teeth. nose now too flat black holes without that straight curve of flesh in front of it-_

_he roars, he shrieks and i realize the knife is still in me and the bastard drops. he swing at me and i stagger-_

_-his sword flashes past me and i hear it sing in front of my eyes, mayhap an eyelash clipped-_

_-then a thunk as it buries into a beam next to the chain-covered wheel to the drawbridge-_

_-stuck fast, but he's pulling-_

_-and the beast is screaming at me for vengeance and i answer and grab the hilt of the flaying knife and rip it out-_

_-stepping forward and reversing it in my hand-_

_dead cunt looks at me and he can't fucking believe-_

_as my hand jerks up between us_

_and the knife crunches through his lower jaw_

_jams into the roof of his mouth, skewering his tongue as it goes_

_he makes a sound. i can't even name it. like a distant cat mewling. so deep in his throat it's like his lungs are speaking directly to me._

_blood soaking my hands. pouring down my hand and fuck it, i'm amazed he has any_

_i grab the side of his head and want to say something like from the stories but all i think is-_

_"You fuckin' **lose**."_

Whatever's left in me, I pull it from my chest and my legs and into my arms. Bolton coughs again and I can still see thoughts crackling behind his eyes, still scheming. I could almost fucking laugh. Especially when I brace my hands against his head and shoulder and yank my body to the side, taking him with my, big and buggered and bleeding body twisting around with all the strength I have left.

Could stab deeper. Could break his neck. Could bite his fucking throat out. But this will be better.

His men will see it.

No breath left to roar, I just growl like what I am, and hurl the Leech Lord cunt out the window over the drawbridge and there's gargle to serve as an epitaph as he goes flailing through the air, a vulture without wings.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *lights post-battle cigarette* Ah... MUCH better. Enjoy!


	31. Chapter 31

**NIALL**

He wanted it over. His arms ached and throbbed with exertion, but he couldn't even will his fingers to relax around his bastard's hilt. He had blood on his face and not all of it was his, but still he wiped filth from his face with the filth on his sleeve. He was limping, his thigh cut and pulsing waves of pain hounded up his body with every step, but still he ran and stomped through puddles of blood. 

It was no longer just fighting, or battle, or butchery. It was endurance. It was slogging through horror and forcing your mind and body and soul not to break. Not until the other man did. You hardened them all and locked away that part of you that could love and feel. 

Niall had let go of Theon's hand in the doorway, when his eyes went glassy as a doll's and the candles in them blew out. He'd crouched over him as clansmen ran past him and the clansman next to him had cursed and walked away, one more little battle of his lost in a daily campaign that would surely include many more. But Niall did not move. He'd seen the desperation and the pain and the fear pouring from the unwilling eunuch's eyes. The way he'd gasped and how his tongue writhed, trying to make words. 

His final smile when Stannis thundered past them with the Manderlys in tow, a crashing tide of metal and flesh and hooves and swords and vengeance that would sweep into Winterfell and wash away the stain of his betrayal. He'd helped make that happen. He knew that, and with a sigh, Niall saw him stop holding on.

"Wait," he said in a rasp, out of instinct, "Don't-"

Theon died with that smile, holding the hand of a man he barely knew. Niall swallowed hard and closed his eyes with his fingertips. Steel screaming on steel and just plain _screams_ were echoing and rattling down from the gatehouse within. Men were still dying, and he needed to see to that. 

"Be at peace," he said quietly to the dead man, standing up and saying the only words he imagined could be applied to any man, any gods. Then he was pounding up those stairs, teeth gritted against the strain in his knees as he took them two at a time, until-

"We surrender! Please, m-mercy!"

He winces and nearly turns away when he gets to the top of the winding staircase and sees the clansmen butcher the bleeding, broken, begging Boltons. They don't even deign to answer them. Just step forward, bringing their axes down a few times for each man, wet thunks and cracks of heavy blades through ribs and muscles and organs and everything soft surrounding them. 

But it's only a "nearly". Another _instinct_ , as he understands it. Something that will fade away or be drawn from him as he endures more days like this. And he knows he will.

 _They're Boltons_ , he reminds himself, nodding briefly at the men as he strides past, ignoring the hot bodies and the steaming blood spreading across the floor. _They would have tortured you for all you knew, then flayed you alive and hung your corpse from the walls. Or just cut your head off. Or killed you as easily as those men just were._  

He opens his mouth to ask whether or not the gatehouse was secure, but he can within moments that for the now, Sandor's bloody plan has worked. Dreadfort men litter the staircase, the room before the one holding the chains to the gate. Though the pick- and ax-shattered door, he can see hide-covered Flints rushing to the doors to the battlements, leaving the chain-wrapped windlass alone. Why bother, after all? The gate is open. The building is secure.

_No. It is **taken**. Now we have to **hold** it. _

And there were plenty of men who wanted to stop them. A handful of clansmen were at each door to the battlements, straining their backs and legs and arms, pressing against the locked doors as what sounded like massive Summer Isle apes pounded at them. The heavy _thwack_ of axes and maces cracked out over and over; a low, flat _boom_ from one of them... gods, someone had found a sodding  _battering ram_. Niall cast his eyes about quickly and saw a fair few of his clansmen on the ground, also. 

But only the dead were still. The wounded, even those who bore mortal wounds, were up, hands filled, eyes grim and set in paling faces. They would die standing, or fighting, at least. A dozen-no, just shy of a score. Ten to each side until...

Niall looked to his front, and could see the avalanche of horsemen pouring towards the gate, a fat horde of armored soldiers that tapered into a thin, packed point like water draining into a pot. He saw men fall and horses under them, a withering hail of arrows and quarrels still gnawing at their sides... but they were still coming. The gates were open, the bridge was down, and for now, there was no stopping them. And beyond them, Niall saw the fast-approaching kin of the men with him. Many more times the Manderly's number, bellowing breathlessly even as they ran and heaved through waist-deep snow, axes and greatswords and staffs waving above their heads. Thousands of them. All heading for the gate.

One of the clansmen screamed and Niall turned to see him fall, head of the ax that had bit into his back still sticking through the gash it had made. Niall lunged forward but the man was already down, deer hide jerkin ripped open and soaked. The thick, knobbly bone running down his back was smashed through and he twitched and gurgled blood and bit down hard, eyes wide and disbelieving and-

Then he just stopped. It lasted but moments, and by the time Niall's mouth opened to say something, he knew he'd be speaking the words to a dead man.

He felt the tremble in him long before he could place a word to it. His breath drew in and out in great, halting waves, eyes wide and lips pulling back and back until his teeth were born-

_Another dead. The cavalry's here, the rest aren't far behind, but even now, they're dying._

_My men. Good men. So fucking **close** -_

"Bastards," he said in a snarl, standing up and walking to the wall, where the ax head had been pulled back by the Bolton man struggling behind it, and Niall could see frantic movement through the gash. "Fucking _bastards_ -"

The pain and ache in his arms vanished in that tide of trembling; without word or decision it flowed and jerked his arm up and back, and he thrust through the hole-

-grimacing somewhere between a grin and a snarl as he felt the blade bite through cloth and tear through flesh, drawing a scream and he pulled it back-

-fresh blood on the blade, glistening under a scrap of cloth-

-and Niall stabbed again, but there was no-one for the blind sword to find, and he pulled it back before some clever sod sought to grab it and keep it there. 

"Hold the door," he barked, even as part of him thundered _who the fuck are you to give these men orders, boy?_

He ignored it, crossing the corpse-riddled room in three easy strides to the opposite window, looking at the interior of the Winterfell. Or, rather, the hundred foot wall surrounding it, the towers studding the wall, parapets running across it, broad and tall gatehouse like the one he stood in, the frozen moat between the two... and the drawbridge. Now clogged with men and horses and fighting and dying and praying and wailing-

"Fuck me!"

The words burst from his lips before he could stop them, blasting out with his breath as he saw the flailing figure in grey armor hurled out of the window overlooking the drawbridge like he was a bag of useless scraps. Niall blinked and saw a flash of a ruined face, eyes too far to make out but the pale features splotched and marred with red, arms and legs kicking out and grabbing at empty air until-

He crashed down to the wood with a crunch that seemed to break _Niall's_ bones just from the _looking_. A few hundred pounds of fast moving man in an iron suit stopped dead in the space of a broken moment, and even through the chaos of the horsemen wading through pikemen and crossbowmen on the bridge he could hear the crowded crack and slap and wet snapping of a dozen bones breaking like tree branches. The armored figure twitched and... gods, he was still _alive_... still trying to move his arms that were broken, legs that were mangled and lying at hideous angles, trying to look up-

Niall turned away with a grimace as Stannis and the leading Manderly horsemen crashed over him, thousands of pounds of assorted flesh and metal channelled into steel-shod hooves pounding down at him over and over, denting solid armor as easily as molded paper, crunching through his skull, smearing his hands off with their impacts. He looked away from the dead, unknown figure at where he came from instead and-

"... Sandor?"

He was not mistaken. You'd have to be a fucking idiot not to know _that_ face, even from nearly a hundred paces. Straight black hair now a gore-choked mess, no longer covering a face that was so stained and bloody it didn't matter. His mouth hung slack and his great chest was heaving from exertion, half-glimpsed flurries of movement at his sides telling Niall that Sandor and his clansmen were facing the same problem: rallying enemies and none from their allies. But the highborn lords leading the horsemen were still pouring over the drawbridge, the Dreadfort pikemen breaking apart like a thin fleshy wall before a ram made of charging metal. The moat on either side was cracked and churning, drowning and struggling men cursing their armor and horses kicking at the ice trying to get back onto solid ground. 

The carting boy licked his lips and looked back up. Surely they would last. It was Clegane, after all, he could-

Then, like some moment from a nightmare leapt from his mind into the waking, he saw Sandor stagger... one hand pressed to his side... then fall against the vast windlass... and slide down it... out of sight.

"Fuck!"

He had to go. Sandor needed him and now-

A thunderclap slammed into one of the doors and the crackling crash of breaking door followed it. Niall turned just in time to see the unseen battering ram finally do its job, smashing the bolts from the wall and he door, a frothing throng of Dreadfort men already grasping and thrusting through it even as the clansmen were pushed aside, swinging their axes blindly into the opening door-

Niall swallowed. No time for Sandor. They had a duty to accomplish, even and especially because Sandor was... was...

He ground his teeth. He buried that thought in blackness. He choked it with the sights in front of him and only those. In anger and a cloak of rage that he'd never felt before, all of it exploding out in his thrusting arm and-

_i bury it through the chest of the first bolton bastard through the door, and twist it before pulling it out, like sandor showed me. he staggers back and his fellows push him aside even as blood leaks out his mouth and gushes from the hole in his chest, eager to-_

_the clansmen roar and i scream and it's fear and hate and anger and we rush to each others' deaths above the storm of hooves._

 

**WYLIS**

_Tough bastard, I'll give him that bloody much._

Wylis watched Stannis take that quarrel in the arm without flinching, then charge the short but dense line of Dreadfort men on the bridge. Wylis and Umber were not far behind him, flanking him, and the drawbridge was almost so narrow there was little room for anyone else. A fresh storm of bolts and arrows were flying at them from the inner parapets, claiming his house's horsemen with every moment, and the fat lord of the New Castle felt every roll of his bulky form shift and juggle under his armor-

_We're going to die. There's no way-_

Then something with a ruined face and grey armor smacked down on the bridge behind them all. Heads formerly aiming bows looked around in confusion and saw-

Wylis frowned. Even at that distance, it seemed like-

_To the hells with who it looks like! What does it matter?!_

He spurred on Thunder but the Dreadfort men seemed to have the same flash of realization, turning back to the army bearing down fast on them and firing-

They flew so close to him. He could make them out as they whipped by his head, snapping as they went like vast wasps or striking birds. Behind him a man screamed and then gurgled, bolt in his throat, and Wylis wondered if that bolt had been for him instead. Mors Crowfood roared for the last time and fell back from his horse, broad chest too large of a target, a pair of quarrels sticking clean through it and with a splash like a comet landing he vanished under the icy water-

Stannis kept riding. Through the rain of iron and wood, he rode. Until they came to the pikes and he slashed and roared-

Wylis with him, body not his own, pain flying away from him, or rather staying right there on that bridge as his mind went beyond it, looking down at his body and... gods, he wished his father was there. Wylis had been weaned on tales of the Rebellion, the Battle of the Trident, his father magnificent on a charger, leading House Manderly alongside Ned and King Robert. Now he rode with a new King, reluctant mayhap, but still... to free Winterfell. To punish traitors and murderers and repay a debt centuries old. The North remembers. They were proving it that day. 

He smiled above his body, seeing fat arms made huge and gleaming carving through pikemen, sending them scattering into the water, battered under Thunder's hooves, falling back in chaos, in disbelief, only to turn and see-

Lord Bolton is dead! Our lord has fallen! 

Wylis heard the cries echo and ripple until they found fresh minds to gain purchase on, and then he knew the rot would spread fast as the most virulent pox. All it took was one death witnessed in plain sight, and the horror and shock would spread. Already he could see Dreadfort men rumble, throw their pikes and swords away and run, deeper into the castle, as if it would save them. Fresh columns were trooping it, but at the gate, the word spread fast, and the despair with it.

_They served not out of loyalty, but fear. Terror of him, his Bastard, and the Lannisters in the south... that was what he relied on to rule. The worst of them loved him, but only for what he could give them. Now he is dead, and they are the men of a ghost._

Lord Wylis smiled, and knew the tide was turning. He thought of Leona, and how proud she would be-

-then realized he was so far from his body, he could not float back to it.

"My lord?! Wylis?!"

Oprey. That sounded like Ser Oprey. He could barely hear him, though, all the way up there. Felt his hands on him, and... why wasn't he on Thunder?

He looked down and saw him, at the end of the bridge, in the mouth of the gatehouse. Saw himself. Cradled in the old man's arms, tears on the knight's cheeks that he never thought he would see. But he did, and they were for him. Him and the bolts in his chest and Wylis gasped-

 

**OPREY**

"Please, my lord... don't have me greet your father with this news."

Oprey knew it was a selfish thing to beg of a dying man, but he couldn't help it. The words or his grief. For twenty years he'd sworn his shield, his steed and his life to the Manderly's. He'd sparred with Wylis and ate with him, drank with him, been taken into his confidences through good and bad. Now the pudgy youth had become a brave man, strong and fearless under the same rolly-polly joviality his father his his steel behind...

And now he was dying on the very cusp of Winterfell. The fruit of all their efforts and gambles was finally falling, and Wylis had fallen with it.

"Please," Oprey whispered to the stone over his head, even as blood dripped from the murder holes and men fought and died above him. " _Please_ don't let him die..."

Stannis and the rest of the horsemen were already pouring into the courtyard, heedless of the arrows and bolts poured on them from three directions. Bowmen were lining the walls but the fire they were laying on was a trickle compared to the knights and cavalry streaming past the gate and spreading out across it, sheer weight of horses and metal putting them to flight and their thoughts of fighting back. There's even space for them to get up a fair speed again, Stannis himself leading a second, short charge across the courtyard and shattering a wave of Dreadfort reinforcements before they even truly arrive. 

Ser Oprey sees it all, and wants to be part of it. The glory and the tale that will be told, the favor he knows with pragmatic self-interest will be available... but his lord is wounded, and... and he's...

Wylis coughs and it's too wet. Almost choking. Oprey tries to feel around the armor where the bolts are piercing his lord, but he knows from grim and mortal experience that he cannot move them. The heads of the fucking things are all that's keeping a spray of blood from pouring from his lord instead of trickling, but he can see it... dripping through the bottom of the younger man's armor.

"D... Do..."

"My lord, please, save your energy. You?! You, get down here now! Help me tend to Lord-"

"Oprey-"

Such strength in that shaking hand. He gripped tighter to the knight and Oprey's eyes leaked and yet Wylis'... they were clear. With purpose and pride. He tilted his head down and his stare was fierce above his walrus moustache, as if he were not an inch away from The Stranger's embrace. 

"Do... your... du... dute..."

He didn't need to hear the rest as that strong voice devolved into coughing, choking, vomiting, all of it at once and red flecked the young lord's flowing moustache. Ser Oprey held his hand tighter until his head fell forward and almost settled on his broad belly. He waited for it to move again. For him to breath. He waited and waited and shook off a hesitant hand on his shoulder and snarled something horrible and coarse.

_Just a little longer. He's just getting his wind back._

_He's not dead. He's not._

Ser Oprey swallowed and bit down hard on his lip until it bled. 

"... he's gone," he said, then repeated it again just so he could have himself hear it. He looked around him and a clutch of Manderly horsemen were off their steeds and bunched around the two of them, protecting them with their bodies and drawn swords... now looking inward, eyes wet and stunned as Oprey's. But they were men in need of leading, and their lord had given them one final order. 

_Free Winterfell. Restore the Starks. Punish the Boltons and all others who turned their cloaks._

Ser Oprey rose to his feet and gripped his sword tighter. He flashed his eyes around and thought... remembered...

"Kamber? The First Keep is there-" he said, pointing at the vast, rounded hulk of stone with one wall collapsed utterly, arrows and bolts occasionally shooting out of it "-and we must breach it. It has a bridge... covered, I think. Where did you say Lord Wyman would be held?"

"The Great Keep, most likely," Kamber said, already sweating under his plate armor but eager, desperate to take edge to the flesh of the bastards he'd had to stand for so long in this place, Frey and Bolton and turncloak and usurper. "Where their defences are strongest. But that's past the courtyard, the armory-"

"We have no choice," another knight spat out, blood leaking from a slash in his upper arm. "We can't stay bottled up here. We need to spread out, just not to thin they can slice us up piecemeal-"

"What about Stannis?"

They all looked around and found the R'hllor's Chosen laying about himself with only one bloody arm, sword flashing and gleaming and first silver then red then just sending arcs of crimson across the stones. A troop of Manderly knights were with him, forcing back a Dreadfort squadron... forcing them back towards the largest courtyard, and closer to the Keep.

"We follow him, then," Oprey says firmly, knowing quick action is preferable to considered debate in the whirl of battle. "Follow me!"

"Ser Oprey, what about Clegane? The boy Niall, the clansmen-"

"What about them? The way is open, we can-"

"It will not _stay_ so, Abnus!" Kamber shouted again, and Oprey knew when his first name was bellowed, the younger knight was damn serious. "They are besieged from the battlements to the gatehouses, and they will _not_ last long! The bodies of the clansmen they already lost are scattered all about, a score of them, easily-"

"And behind us thousands _more_ and streaming for the gate and-"

"And we will need _all_ of them! The Boltons still have _thousands_ in this place, even without support from the other houses! If we get a few hundred, _maybe_ a thousand men in, only to have the gatehouses fall a _second_ time, we will be _trapped_ , unsupported and surrounded, and they will-"

"Fine, fine, gods!" 

The old knight shook his head and thrice-cursed Sandor fucking Clegane. The man was a wretch, murderous and wicked and saved from the gibbet or the ax only by his vow to the Lady Stark. Oprey didn't care to speculate on why she'd chosen such a brute southron savage for her protector, but he did not care for it. She was a direwolf of House Stark and a fine woman, but... foolish, mayhap. Easily swayed.

 _But we **do** need to keep the gates open_ , a voice reminded him, and he spat to one side.

"Kamber? Take a troop and split them between the two! Reinforce them with fresh bodies!"

Ah, the young man wasn't expecting _that_ , eager as he was. "Me?! But I am to-"

"Do our duty, boy! Those were Lord Wylis' last words! I am giving you orders, you are _duty-bound_ to obey!" Oprey had to bite back the smirk that spread over his face. Damn pup was too eager to command, write his name into the tales. Damned if Oprey had lost his lord to have some brat order him around instead, and in front of his fellows, no less. "You care so badly for Clegane? Go up and tend to him, protect him. I'm sure he'll sodding kiss you for it..."

Kamber's face flushed and before he could sputter a protest, Oprey swept to his feet, leaving Wylis' corpse in his wake. There was... nothing else to be done. He stated to run after Stannis and his mounted squad, already hearing metal boots crash down on the stones around him, following him to join the Stormlands claimant. Hearing Kamber barking orders, wrangling and snatching handfuls of men from the stream of Manderly colors rushing into the courtyard-

Frowned slightly. Something else, from deeper in the castle. The consequences of the spreading word? Mayhap, because when he listened closer...

"Young Wolf! Young Wolf!"

"The North Remembers! The North Remembers!"

"Red Wedding, Red Wedding, Red Wedding!"

Ser Oprey snorted in shock. It wasn't coming from their men, the Manderly's pouring into Winterfell. It was not the Dreadfort men, surely, so... the other houses. They knew they were breached and mayhap they knew that Bolton had been slain, or that Lady Sansa was among them, and now he could hear their chants gain power and cohesion, a score becoming a hundred, then hundreds, voices becoming rampaging roars vanishing into clashes of steel.

 _The North remembers_ , he thought with grim satisfaction. _The farce is done._

 

**WYMAN**

The true and living lord of House Manderly was thinking much the same thing when he heard those ragged, pulsing chants echo beneath him, but an ever-japing voice told him he would dearly have loved to see the final bow from all the mummer's. That didn't look like it would be the case.

Sers Rufus and Eric were braced against the door to his chambers, backs against the bookcase and table they dragged in front of it. A trio of Dreadfort killers were sprawled out on the floor, utterly ruining the carpets, the bastards. Two had died fast and certain, the last had a clean cut across his throat.

The knife bearing his blood was still in Lord Wyman's hand. He'd not be led to slaughter like some fat bull long past worth for siring. If the men in that hallway were so certain and bent on his end, he would gouge the price of it from their damn hides first.

The clamor on the door only got louder as it went on, and finally their desperate barricade started to waver. Wyman looked from the struggling knights and to the window overlooking the North Gate. The armory and the shattered remnants of the First Keep blocked some of the view, but he could still see, still silently, mutely gloat...

_Manderly horsemen. My knights. The first into Winterfell to liberate her. Hundreds of them, by the looks of it. Must have been the White Harbor men **and** Kamber's. Clansmen behind them... yes... yes, now I can see them in the courtyard. Quite a run you had, my shaggy friends, but now you're here-_

Another crash outside, and the door gives. The two knight back away from it, hefting shields and swords and preparing themselves. Wyman does the same, limping over and filling his free hand with another dagger. It would be a quick fight. They would lose, and brutally, overwhelmed in moments by Dreadfort bastards.

But much could be done in a handful of moments. Lives taken. Wrongs righted. The memory of a man smote onto his killer's flesh, and Wyman was determined to-

Then the three of them frowned. The hammering, banging, battering progress... it was replaced by the cries of rushing men and the clang of steel. Screams and screeches, tearing of cloth and the sounds of tapestries and lamps knocked over in the melee. There was some contest beyond the door, but they could not see whom was-

Wyman nearly jumped when the hammering returned. Slower, but even harder. Now the door shook and pulsated with every impact, the numbers of those entreating violent entry only increased. Not much longer now. He gripped his blades and exchanged glances with his last two fellows.

 _Gods, I wish you were here, Wylis_ , he thought selfishly, then immediately squashed the thought. _No... No, I don't. One of us must live, for our house. If it must be between you and me, well... better an old man than a young one._

Rufus and Eric nodded back to him stoically, then turned their gaze to the door, raised their shields and slid in front of their lord. They'd sworn to die defending him, and now the time had come for just that. But Wyman saw no tremble in their limbs nor sweat on their faces. They'd been prepared for this day; they knew when they had been chosen that if Winterfell was attacked or besieged and Manderly any way involved, Bolton would wreak his punishment on their half-crippled lord. That was unacceptable to them, and they would defend him with their lives.

Which would be taken, eventually, by skill or sheer numbers. And they accepted it.

"I a lucky... to die with..." he said, voice a pained wheee, but honestly, what were a few moments of pain at that time? "... such brave... sworn men..."

They just smiled and readied themselves. The door was jumping now, bolts shaking on the eaves, hinges bulging with every-

One final blow and the door was blasted inwards, closet and table pushed aside with a screech like a dying horse across the stone. A riot of fighting men were outside, some of them cleaved and bloody, others lying still at their feet, and as they poured in Wyman raised his daggers and-

"Peace, Manderly! We are not here by the wishes of a dead lord..."

The fat lord frowned and searched his mind for a name to match the stubbly face and the jet-black hair crowning a smooth, shapely face. His piggy eyes flicked down to the sigil over his chest, red tridents on a white background, and the head of a horse...

"Ser... Condon?" He rasped but plowed on even as the man smiled and nodded. "Sworn to... Lady..."

"Cerwyn, my lord," Ser Condon said easily, gesturing to the troop of men behind him, all bearing the ax sigil of House Cerwyn. "And we're damn well done following a dead man."

"D... Dead?"

"Lord Bolton has been killed, they say," Ser Condon said, lips pursed as he spoke, as if knowing adding "they say" was a strange code among men for "it might be true, it might not be", and sincerely hoping it was. "Slain by Stannis' champion, a monster that rose from the crypts. Don't know how much stock I put in that, but if he is dead, then his Bastard is days away and there's no-one else who cares to follow him, save his own men... and we've been dealing with them, my lord."

The Cerwyn soldiers chuckled grimly, and Manderly craned his neck to see the blood on their swords. Covering their tunics and liveries. Those were men that had killed their way through the Great Keep, that much seemed clear. He could hear a great buzz of voices like a beehive, the hallways filled with them. How many others would be out there, he wondered, eager to throw off their hated farce of loyalty to Bolton, rise from their bent knees not in thanks, but in a deadly lunge?

The huge man managed to straighten up, one arm draped over each of the knights at his side. Eric and Rufus took his weight easily now, quite used to it, switching their swords so that they were held in their outside hands, ready to swing about at any who may have approached. 

"You have... more work... here...?"

"Indeed, my lord. Other hostages to free, and this building to secure. Once we do, the Boltons will have no final rathole to run to, and Stannis and your people and whoever the hells else has come for vengeance can butcher them in the open. I'd ask if you cared to come, but you're-"

Wyman grunted and growled though his trembling throat sent spikes of pain jabbing through him. But he still managed to push off the two knights at his side and straighten as much as his belly allowed. He'd waited too long. Been useless too long. Now his men, his house, his knights, _his son_ , were within Winterfell and damned if he'd lie back in bed and have Cerwyn men defend him while his own died.

"My... throat... was cut... Ser... not... my legs... nor my... my arms..." He gripped the daggers in his hands and raised them pointedly. "Lead... on..."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "There is a beast in every man, and it stirs when you put a sword in his hands."  
> -Jorah Mormont
> 
> Oh, and here's the map of Winterfell again, if anyone needs it. ;-)
> 
>  


	32. Chapter 32

**STANNIS**

He could have prayed, he supposed, but he doubted the Lord of Light would have answered. He'd already seen him through a shower of bolts and arrows and emerge with but a single wound; as miraculous as a man charging through a raincloud and only getting struck by a single drop. Compared to that, entreating for him to remove that one blemish was... almost petty.

 _And it was as much to do with terrified archers and frozen bow strings_ , he reminded himself, cold pragmatism clashing with the zeal the Red Lady had stoked in him. He held onto that as the first courtyard vanished behind them, his clutch of Manderly and Florent knights following hard, losing some, keeping many, chasing the Bolton men into the godswood and the guesthouse, the kennels, the armory, scattering and slaughtering them but still...

 _We advance too far, we shall be cut off_ , he told himself harshly. Fiery conviction would carry a body far, but it would be over a damn cliff if common sense did not temper it. He pulled back hard on Lightcarrier's reins and the war horse whinnied-

-almost as loud as he growled. His left arm had now succumbed to reality, the flush of battle-madness that first numbed him not lasting. Now shards and pins and nails stabbed through him from shoulder to fingertips whenever he moved it. The unsmiling Lord of Dragonstone spat out in disgust, wishing he could vomit up his weakness and exhaustion with it. The walls were breached, the gates subverted, and now he could see crowds of clansmen following them, spreading out with eyes wide and bugging from their heads, battle-madness soon to take them.

_But it is not over. We lost plenty to arrow and bolt. Many knights. Lord Umber. Lord Manderly. Without leaders to direct them..._

Stannis cast his eyes around the huge courtyard around which the rest of Winterfell seemed to be spread. The towering black block of the Great Hall was to the south-east, beyond yet another inner wall, alive with rushing figures. To the south was the smithy, the stables, kennels, the maester's tower and the library... all of them ravaged by fire and disaster, as if the Bastard's touch was as destructive as dragons. Now filled with countless dances of death, men hacking and slashing and stabbing at each other. Beating with cudgels and maces. Stones and their own helmets and metal gauntlets. 

Everywhere Stannis turned, men died. His men. Boltons. Winterfell groaned and howled like it was devouring itself, ripping apart from halls and courtyards, walls and rooms, stables and towers. Men were dragged from horses to be pounded into the dirt; or slain by men astride them. Clansmen hewed men into pieces even as they fell, bloody, savage faces blind to all pain, all hesitation. Dreadfort men fought with desperate bravery, fighting their way back to the Great Keep, the armory already overrun-

Stannis frowned. Pushed the rest of the horror away, unimportant to him as it was. These men were to die for him, if they needed to. He accepted their deaths, but did not trouble himself overmuch with them.

If die they did, it was because their duty and his own required it. 

"Lord... Ser Loren?!" He ground out between his teeth, forcing his mind and tongue into tandem above the pain throbbing through his whole body. "Look to the gate of the Great Keep! What see you?!"

The young knight of House Glover shook his helm of the blood clinging to it and looked... and frowned... saw the same thing as his King. 

"They're... They're trying to breach their own fucking gates!"

Stannis frowned minutely. Forgetting the pain and shock and ocean of blood around him, just thinking in some impossibly, insanely calm way that a knight so young should not casually bandy about such lowborn words. But there was a time and a place for critique and for now-

"Red Wedding, Red Wedding, Red Wedding-!"

They heard the chance. Drowning out the calls for Lord Roose and Ramsay and the Flayed Man. The Boltons had the edge in numbers, for sure, but now Stannis could see their erstwhile allies had barricaded them out of their own damn Keep, and the Great Hall. Arrows and rocks and bolts were raining down on Bolton men as well as his own now; the rot had set in and with Bolton dead, there was nothing left to unify his forces. 

Nor hold back the tidal wave of hatred the Northerners had bottled in them for all those that bore the Flayed Man. 

"Ser Loren, take your knights and press to the Great Keep! We will go to the Great Hall with the clansmen when they-"

Something whistled through the air, past his ear, cut off by a wet thunk of impact and a spray of blood across his face. A Manderly horseman choked and vomited up what seemed like his whole heaving heart as he fell from his horse, splattered his life up over the terrified beast's flank as it went. Lightcarrier whinnied and bucked and with only one arm-

Stannis toppled from him, twisting in the air to land on his "good" arm as best he could... which didn't help matters much. He slammed onto the churned mud and the pain smacked into him to hard it was like a black hammer threatening to knock out his eyes. He gasped and by the Lord... even the energy to take a fresh breath seemed beyond him. His steed was careening away from him, struck by a bolt as it went and then vanishing in the throng of struggling men. A roar in the Old Tongue, a wave of roiling anger headed by the Norrey's, the Wulls, the Liddells. And at the front of it, the Young Flint, sword as long as himself swinging like a comet around his head, screaming and taking off heads and arms as he and his kin clashed into a new clutch of Boltons.

The King swallowed... choked... vomited it back up. He couldn't die here. He would not die here, not with so much left to do. The mantra took hold in his mind like it had so many times; he was... he was _needed_. He had his duty, as did all men, but his was greater. Chosen by a god. Chosen by fate to become the next ruler of the Seven Kingdoms. So much on his shoulders and thus he needed to be stronger than other men, to push away his pain and hesitation and weakness and-

Rise to first one foot... then the other... until by the time his knights had dismounted, he was upright, gulping down lungfuls of air that reeked of ice and spilled guts and mud and smoke. 

"Your Grace, are you-"

"Lord Florent, find the Young Flint and bring him to me. He and his people will join us in attacking the Great Hall. The rest will assault the Great Keep-"

"And our horsemen, my lord?"

"Ser Oprey? How fares Lord Wylis?"

The stern knight's dirt-and-blood-streaked face cracked with sorrow and Stannis nodded in understanding. Another ally taken from him... but another lord he didn't need contend with once Winterfell was taken. Lady Sansa was proving more formidable than he'd anticipated; not the meek and trembling girl he'd remembered those handful of times they'd met. She was more akin to Lady Jonelle now, a woman not easily cowed. Melisandre... she'd know how to handle her. The levers to pull and points to touch. Lord Wyman would be trouble enough, devious as he was to plot behind Bolton's back. He'd easily do the same for-

_Not the time for intrigues. Still a battle to be won._

"Ser, take your horsemen and push to the north-east... that way, through the guard's hall and the armory. We'll smash them against the walls or let them flee out the gates and die in the wilderness."

"Aye, Your Grace!"

An eager cry, and the title fell easily from the stoic knight. Stannis made a note of that. He would need allies in the North, men like himself who could see the concerns of all, just not the wants of the few.

"Men of the Flints!" Stannis cried, raising his sword high and wishing it would flame again for him, just as the skies groaned and grumbled above them and rain began to hurtle down from the lead clouds. "Men of the Stormlands! Follow me! Follow your King!"

 

**WYMAN**

The fat man pulled his daggers from the throat and ribs of the man he'd pinned to the wall with his vast stomach, lifting his chin at the cry he heard from beyond the window. The gasping youth in a Dreadfort coat, tanned leather down past his knees, grasped feebly at him and found no purchase, ignored as he died... and Lord Wyman grunted at the high, dense voice that called men to rally behind him, 

"He... sounded... enth... enthusias... astic."

Ser Rufus yanked his sword from the Ryswell soldier he'd cut down a moment before, Eric putting the finishing touches on another further down the hall. Corridors and anterooms once clean and clear were now sprinkled with corpses, painted with blood and haunted by dying men. Their Cerwyn comrades were moving swiftly through the Great Keep, staying in a rough but firm line, using the confines of the halls to their advantage.

Ryswell. Dustin. Legions of Dreadfort men. A smattering of surviving Freys. Wyman would think there were a half-dozen enemies for every ally inside the Keep, even without the force of thousands outside laying siege to the castle. But the time for scheming and double-tongued flattery was over. Now it was for steel and blood to decide, and see whose will broke first, and who fled the castle in disgrace or chose to die there.

"My lord," Rufus said with a stern look, or as stern as a knight would manage for his liege-lord. "I beg you, do not speak unless you have to. It is bad enough you exert yourself in this-"

Wyman grimaced and waved a hand. Rufus reluctantly shut his mouth, looked at his fellow knight, and got only a shrug in return. They were but his shields, and not his will nor his feet or hands. If Lord Lamprey wanted to waddle from his chambers and get his blades wet on traitorous blood, they would follow him.

"Fat _fuck!_ "

_Speaking of which..._

A fresh handful of them pounded down the hallway, long coats flapping, sword and spear in hand and raised. The fat lord grinned most jovial as Rufus and Eric met the Dreadfort's rushing fury with cold, professional killing speed. They blocked with their shields, countered with their swords or parried with them, broke noses and arms with the iron edges of shields or cut low, opening thick veins between legs or slitting stomachs.

One made it past. He slashed at Wyman with a sword, a downward stroke-

_A lifetime ago. His feet small and bare on the dirt of the training yard in White Harbor, air tinged and charged with salt and Summer rain. A body far lighter than the one he bore, though he was ever a pudgy and blockish boy. But he could move well. He could dodge the grizzled knight who trained him, came at him-_

-in the same manner as this Dreadfort whoreson, slashing down, heavy blow that could take off an arm but overconfident, overexerting-

-Wyman easily sidestepping, sword slicing through empty air, Wyman's left dagger already moving-

-stabbing into the man's stomach from the side, drawing a scream of pain-

_Retaliation. He'll try to get back at your for that._

His other dagger came up before the Dreadfort man had even started to swing back to him, sword trembling and spasming uselessly in the air as Wyman twisted the other inside him, ripping the whole wider-

-Wyman growled and spat red-flecked effluence into that stunned, pasty face as he pulled the dagger free from his stomach-

-tearing a whole big enough for stinking ropes of guts and pulsing innards to spill onto the floor.

_My deepest apologies, Ned. We'll have long days of scrubbing ahead after this._

His shields dispatched the others with the same businesslike efficiency as always, and Wyman was grateful for them not seeing him hiss and press a dagger-filled hand to the messy bandage on his neck. The one now soaked and leaking as the wound reopened, his damn honor and pride drawing him to furious, straining battle. Damnit... gods, and now Rufus was-

"My Lord?! Are you-"

He put a hand on his shoulder and Wyman shoved him off as gently as he could. They worried about him. They cared for him. They loved him. But he did not need their damn clucking that day. He dropped one of the daggers and pressed his hand to his neck, keeping the pressure hard and constant. Then he gestured down the hall, where the Cerwyns had vanished to.

"Lead. I follow."

They did as they were bid and within moments the sound of furious skirmish were assailing them again. Turning the corner, down some winding stairs... and they found the Cerwyns and Ser Condon forming a thick half-circle around the open wicket gate built into the larger gates to the courtyard beyond the Great Keep. A constant stream of Bolton men were trying to enter it, hacking and swinging, begging and cursing even as they did... but their numbers were useless so closely packed together. The Cerwyns were butchering them with grim monotony as they emerged, axes falling over and over, until the bodies were three deep and they had to step back, but still, there were more Boltons.

"Help. Them!" 

Wyman rasped his order and limped after his shields as they ran to obey. If the Boltons were struggling to take shelter in the Keep, surely the battle was turning deathly ill for them outside. If they could trap them there, between the axes of their one-time allies and the swords of Stannis and his soldiers, they would be cut to pieces. 

Then he looked up. Pounding feet, a great multitude of them, echoed and rocked the walls and ceiling, making the tapestries on them tremble. There were men fast approaching, and Wyman gripped his dagger tighter, thinking quickly-

"Armory."

"My lord?"

"Armory... bridge!" Wyman rasped harshly, cursing his own glib tongue for getting him into this mess. He pressed his hand harder and quashed the pain throbbing in his neck, growling out the words. "There's a bridge... from the Keep to... the armory. We need to... hold it. Before the bas... bastards can get... from there, to here."

Ser Condon nodded and gestured to the troop of hulking Umbers that had arrived, all of them carrying maces and polearms, bearing white beards down to their navels and eyes thirsty for vengeance. Wyman winced in sympathy at the looks on their faces. They knew that their turning on Bolton would likely condemn The Greatjon... but the Starks had returned. The family they loved so much, bound up in the son they never thought to see again. How could they greet Ned in the next world, if they had to tell him when the time came for them to fight for his child and his home, they had instead struggled with the men who had usurped him?

_How could any of us?_

"Go with Lord Wyman," Condon barked abruptly to the towering men of Umber. "And his shields. Hold that bridge, do not let the Dreadfort soldiers from the Armory surprise us!"

Cold, flinty eyes surrounded by crows feet and wrinkles nodded their silent agreement, even if it was some damn boy giving them orders. Hother Umber, a gangly old man with more hair on his chin than on his skull, was more skeleton than bear, little meat on his bones... but grim purpose in his eyes now. The kind that had been lacking from them for long weeks. Wyman saw that all of them were old men, destined to diethat Winter, little good as warriors... and mayhap that was what they wished for. 

_A glorious death. Redemption in the eyes of the Young Wolf and his sire._

"Eric! Rufus!" He barked, spitting a scarlet gob to one side and nodding at his knights. "We are with... with House Um... Umber today."

They didn't question or even shrug. They took position at his flanks, helping him up the stairs when he needed, a whole troop of decrepit but determined Umbers trailing behind him, heading into the hurricane of sound above them, instead of fleeing like sane men.  

 

**SANSA**

 

She could not wait any longer, though she knew it was her own bloody advice she'd be throwing aside. Winterfell was dying and it's death rattle was the screams of a thousand men. An endless din of steel and crying voices. She was Lady Stark and she needed to be inside that castle, needed to see it again, to lay her eyes on-

_Him. That is all you care for, and you know it. Lie to them, girl, but never to yourself. In time, you may be the only one you can be true with._

Sansa breathed in sharply as the voice invaded her mind, seemingly from outside of herself. It was cold and without compassion... Baelish. That was who it sounded like. All-knowing, or at least always acting thus; her mentor in the game she so despised and he lived for. But while she played the game and did her best to restore her family through herself, she knew there was another pull, a powerful need that had nothing to do with thrones or power or highborn chicanery. 

It was Sandor. She saw his face the night before, tight with emotion he refused to express, walking swiftly away from her before his heart betrayed him. She realized that this had been the longest time for weeks that she'd gone without his face, the sound of his clanking armor and his long, swift strides. The smell of earth and sweat and... almonds. Was it almonds? 

Sansa bowed her head and swallowed hard. Too long. 

The mountain clans were still pouring through the North Gate, but the bulk of their number were already inside Winterfell. The battlements still teemed but even from there she could see that the flow to the gatehouses was drying up. The Boltons and what handful of loyal bannermen they had left had given up hope of holding the gates; Sansa supposed they would fall back, find some new place to make their stand, or a gate not clogged with their enemies to escape from.

She gripped her reins tighter, decision made. Jonelle would never let her hear the end of this.

"The North Gate is ours," she said aloud, enough for the motley squadron of Manderly horsemen and Lady Cerwyn's shields to hear her. "We will move to it."

She saw heads swivel her way in surprise, mutterings follow it but reminded herself that she did not _need_ their permission: she was a Stark of Winterfell, and those men were there because of her. Lady Jonelle, however, cantered over closer to her and murmured, "After what you said, do you think that wise?"

Sansa swallowed. She caught the icy double-meaning lurking under her words. _I could not charge the walls and the fighting, and you convinced me not to... but you can?_

 _Maybe_ , Sansa admitted to herself, _but you do not know why._

The patter of rain became slews of water falling down in sheets, the gods determined to add a fresh layer of hardship to all the men struggling beneath them. Soon a cacophony of rushing, splattering water grew loud around them and Sansa nodded sharply.

"We need to get out of the rain, for one, Lady Cerwyn. For another, there is no risk to us anymore. The gatehouses are secure, as you can see. There is no more fighting there, or what little there is, it is contained." Jonelle would surely see that: the drawbridge and gateway to Winterfell were choked with clansmen, and no flashing steel winked at them from that route. Whatever fighting plagued Winterfell, it was not around that entrance. "We will move closer. Let the men see what they are fighting for, and mayhap the Boltons and their ilk see with their own eyes the Starks have returned."

It seemed a pretty enough reason to her; the kind of ruse and speech a lady from one of her beloved books would use, back when she had believed such fictions as a septon would the holy words of his order. In no mood for debate, Sansa spurred on her horse and they galloped through the muddy snow, now a vast field of churned up foulness that suched at their horses' hooves and slowed them down as if they were traipsing through a bog. But the walls loomed higher and higher, closer... within range.

Sansa clenched her teeth as they passed the broken, pierced, trampled bodies of men and horses that had been struck by marksmen on the walls. Most were still, sightless eyes uncaring as water struck them, staring up at the rain clouds. The rest she blocked out, biting on her lower lip and silently asking their forgiveness, but-

_I need to see him. I need to know he lives, and has not given his life for a home not his own._

As they rode under the gaping stone mouth, the river of mountain men parted for them. Hard, craggy faces turned up to her and where they merely noted her companions, when they fell on her... she could see something close to reverence in them. She still didn't understand it, how men she'd never met could look on her so, but then remembered with pride her father. The Ned, they called him, as if he were something apart from normal men. Old Flint had turned his whole clan from the Wolfswood towards Winterfell under Stannis when he'd heard Arya was to be married to Bolton's upright snake of a bastard. That was how deep their loyalty went.

Sansa suddenly felt very small under their stares, and forced how own to remain focused on the bridge... not that it was an improvement. 

Bodies, bearing colors from a half-dozen houses or none at all, where the clansmen were concerned. They'd been shoved or pushed out the way, some leaning against walls in death, others breathing wetly, rasping out bubbles and blood as they waited for aid or just waited for the end. Sansa saw other bodies bobbing in the holes made in the ice of the moat, face down and drowned; others underneath them, men dragged down by the weight of their own protection, silently screaming forever at the air they would never breath. The horse cantered on and she came to it.

The wreckage of a man in grey armor. Once gleaming and smooth, now hammered and dented many times over, as if a score of mad blacksmiths had taken out all their insanity on the whole suit. Not to mention every scrap of exposed flesh now trampled and torn so badly that she could barely see a speck of unmarred skin. The head was naught but a pulpy mass, a few wisps of hair still clinging to the broken pudding of brains and shattered skull bones. One opaque eye was still open, staring into eternity.

Sansa knew she should be disgusted, horrified, nauseated by the sight of such terrible brutality. The way the man had died, so savagely and without mercy.

But she knew who it was, and remembered what he'd promised her.

A score of men watching raised their eyebrows in surprised approval as Lady Stark, long-departed and well-returned to her home, hawked a steaming gob of contempt onto the mangled face of Roose Bolton, then continued on without a backward glance.

"Clegane? Has anyone seen Clegane?" She started to ask to all and none, head craning around as she did. "Do you... Ser Kamber?"

The Manderly knight staggered from the doorway to the inner gatehouse, his livery torn and painted with blood and other things she'd rather not name, along with his face. His sword was limp in his hand and she could see he bore no wounds, but only a fierce exhaustion. Not in his eyes, though. They were still steady, knowing that his body had long leagues to go before it could sleep. The gatehouses may have held, but the rest of Winterfell was a different matter.

Then the steel in his eyes broke to confusion when he saw the two highborn ladies mere scores of yards from where men were killing each other with abandon, walking over to them and stuttering.

"M-My ladies, wh-what are you-"

"We saw the North Gate was conquered, Ser," Sansa said, sliding down from her horse and onto the blood-soaked stone. "And thought it best to move away from the rain. Do you know if Sa-" She bit her tongue and reined in her words. She still remembered the time before the battle in that frozen field by the White Knife, where she'd let her blurting feelings reveal too much. No, not Sandor. Just- "My sworn shield. Does he still live?"

She had to force herself to deliver her words with calm, poise; just a highborn inquiring about their bannerman. But when she saw Kamber gulp and his eyes look anywhere except to her, she felt the trembling vibrate from her heart outwards, threatening to shake her composure to rubble.

"A-Aye, my lady... he is upstairs... he is badly wounded and-"

Sansa was already running, Jonelle and her shields behind her. Kamber was shouting, warning her of something, but she was taking the stairs as fast as her dress would allow. More dead men at her feet. Bolton and clansmen, men she knew had left with Sandor. So many of them... and yet, he had lived. She was not dead, Kamber hadn't said that. But...

The windlass room was a whirl of frantic activity and snarling voices. Clansmen with their axes mingled with unhorsed Manderly knights with their swords and spears, hurrying to the battlements, entrenched enough to go on the offensive and scour those parapets of their enemies. Sansa saw through them, around them, eyes wide and frantic, seeking on the sight of-

"... no..."

The word dropped from her lips like an anchor into black waters. It was small and broken and barely above a whisper, but fading grey eyes turned slowly to her from the floor. 

He smiled and his eyes seemed to close from the effort. His tanned face was paler than it had been after the lizard-lion had done its damndest to rip his arm off, and when she saw the hand pressed to his side, covered and overflowing with blood, Sansa couldn't stop the sob of horror it tore from her throat.

"Welcome... home..."

 

**SANDOR**

He'd never felt so bloody tired in all his wretched life. 

He'd watch Bolton try to fly and fail, and crash down onto the bridge like a sack of offal, and come apart like one just as well. Mayhap a drunken smile had played cruelly over his lips when that twitching ruin in battered armor had vanished under a torrent of hooves, and whatever hope that the Leech Lord had of surviving the day had been crushed along with his life. Dark, snickering satisfaction had shuddered up his body and then-

Sandor groaned, and he felt a pumping in his side like a hole dashed in the side of a boat. He'd pressed a gauntleted hand to it and felt the wet nightmare that the cunt's flaying knife had smote upon his flesh. A messy, spewing hole that he tried to stop and only succeeded in drenching himself.

The beast growled but withdrew. It's work was done, and it knew better than to try and gain more blood from a form so badly damaged. Sandor had exhaled and felt blood in his mouth, his strength seep away along with his breath...

He'd shuddered and with each shake and tremble, his legs had become... scarce and useless things. He'd slumped down to the stone and felt their chill under his arse, panting until doing so hurt too much, then breathing shallowly... slowly...

The clansmen were pouring to the battlements. He saw knights and horsemen join them, and would have smiled again to know what that meant. 

The plan had worked. Niall's knowledge, his daring, both had been proven right, and Stannis would have his victory.

Sandor chuckled even though it hurt. Bugger Stannis. He'd not pledged his sword to that humorless wanker. It had been for Sansa. Always for Sansa.

_Always._

A face he knew bobbed before him. Kamber, wasn't it? Manderly knight. Good man, as far as he could tell. He'd fussed over him and looked at the hole torn in his side and his wide eyes told Sandor everything. The two men had locked eyes and Sandor tried to shrug.

_It doesn't matter. She'll have her home back. Fair trade for a ragged old dog like me._

He wished he had a full skin to enjoy in his last moments, but mayhap his body was brewing his own inebriation, for he saw her before him, and that couldn't be the case. She was supposed to be on the hill, away from the battle still raging. Yet there she was, tears streaking down her lovely face, lips twisted in a rictus of grief. Hands so soft and smooth like heated silk, against his blood-covered face, stroking his cheeks.

Begging him in words he couldn't hear anymore, but still he spoke.

The words spilled from him. Shade or vision or his mind's own madness, he'd still speak them, one last time. 

He said the words he knew his little hawk wanted to hear from him, that he'd been too frightened to speak to her. Each time she did her chest heaved and more tears leaked from her, head shaking as if her furious, desperate denial could plug a mortal wound. Weak as a crone at her ending, Sandor's hand reached up and covered one of hers at his cheek. Over his scarred side.

Covering it. So she could see just the side Gregor had left him. The side that he smiled with even as the words tumbled and slurred from his lips.

I love you.

I'm sorry.

The stone under him was no longer chilly, was no longer... there. He was floating above it, and the urgent chaos of battle he'd been raised with grew distant, as if those raging men were being dragged far away from them. Sandor felt that emptiness spread up his limbs, and the last sane shred of him knew what was happening.

But she was there, if only in his mind. Vision swimming and pulsing, too dark or too light, plagued with flickering streams of shadow, but still there...

Her hair of spun fire and her eyes like Summer Isle oceans. Red lips and flawless skin, now splotchy and red with weeping.

I'm sorry, he said, with a voice no longer his own, as if his soul were speaking without a body. He felt his head tip back and there was nothing behind him, nothing to hold him back from the fall-

-but her hands on his cheeks. 

I love you, he said, and he fell back into a vast, soft darkness that swallowed him without pain. His eyes narrowed like twin seeing-glasses, and Sandor Clegane thought if that face were his last sight, then the gods weren't all that fucking bad.

_I'm sorry._

_I love you._

_Good_ _bye._


	33. Chapter 33

**THE FLOATING MAN**

It was a dream. It had to be. He was... this was not waking... he knew it.

_But it feels like it should be._

He knew the thought was ridiculous; even the way it dripped into his mind seemed alien to him. He was deep under water, but not drowning. Soundless, formless pressure against him, moist and almost comforting, every direction. He moved his limbs and... felt the thoughts travel down limbs he was aware of but could not feel. 

Panic gripped him like a vice around his chest. He'd heard tell of men who'd taken a bash on the brains and it had left them scrambled, disconnected. They were awake, or aware, but their bodies and tongues were just... trapped. Forever locked inside a prison of slowly rotting, useless meat and bone. No peace and no freedom. He'd never heard of a knife in the side causing such horror, but the fuck did Sandor know about healing?

He started to breathe faster, silent terror shredding his throat until it turned to familiar, comforting anger. _Now_ he could feel his limbs flailing around, pressing against the silk waves but finding no purchase-

Seeing only flashes of light, like the sun glimpsed from under the water, shimmering and winking at him-

Sandor screamed out and the cold struck him, a wind that-

-blinded as it bit into his eyes and screwed them shut-

Wind. Under water? No, not underwater, no-

-longer.

There was ground under him. Snow, packed down hard and firm but his feet were nowhere near the dirt under it all. That same wind, whipping around him like he was a minor irritation to its progress, colder than anything in the South, or the North he had come to know, carrying teeth and withering death with it. 

His eyes came back to him, but what they beheld came slower. Seemed to ripple out from the confines of his body and spread out beyond him, until ranks and curtains of darkness drew back and back until it was the grey horizon and white mountains scuffed with black and brown instead. Sandor looked around him... yes, his body was his own again, every hair and limb and even the nerveless scars pulling half his face into a permanent sneer. 

A whole world of white. Drifts of snow as deep as towers were tall. Sheets of ice the size of towns and endless fields of cracked glaciers like vast mirrors smashed in the ground. All of it without a hint of warmth, not even sun to guide a traveler on his way, light from above smothered by this grey clouds like molten lead.

And yet, there was a tree. And under it Sandor could see a cave. 

Cave. Tunnel. Crypt. Winterfell.

_Sansa._

"Sansa...?"

Laughter. Impossible without a voice, but there it was, and Sandor felt it rather than heard it, dribbling down his spine like ice water. High like a child's but with a knowing undercurrent, amused as a grown man would be at a sly mummer's pantomime.

_I think no matter where you woke, Sandor, that name would be the first thing to pass your lips._

"Who are... where am I?"

_That is not a simple thing to answer. But **this** place is far north of the Wall._

He knew that voice. He'd only heard it once before but-

_Yes. We have spoken before._

Sandor swallowed and it seemed like there was a fair bit of ice in his mouth. Dream or not, he didn't want to freeze his balls off, and started tramping through the snow to the cave entrance. He rubbed his upper arms as he went and... gods, he felt the cold numb and gnaw at him, even under his armor and tunic. It was so real. All of it was fashioned so brilliantly, surely he-

_You'd be amazed what happens in the unknown corners of your soul._

"Do you fucking mind?"

_No, I don't. We don't have the time._

Sandor blinked and paused, looking around for some face to throw his ire at bit finding nothing but a tree-

A tree with a carved face on it. Simply done, not like the careful work in the godswoods of Greywater Watch and the Wolf's Den and, he assumed, Winterfell. Gouged with stone blades or sharpened claws, long before time was time.

Winterfell. The thought of it was enough to tear his thoughts back to her hair and her eyes and that last mask of grief she wore-

_Don't think too hard on her, Sandor. She'll drag you away from here._

"What makes you think I don't want that?"

_I didn't say you'd go to her. I said she'd drag you. You'll try to go back to her but it'll be like trying to drag a sack through a solid wall. You'll go back to the cold and the darkness and the place that is not water. I need you here._

"Why? And who the hells are you, boy?"

That laugh again. Making him shiver even as he got closer to the cave groaning up from the ground, vast and thick and gnarled roots piercing from above and eating further down around its entrance. 

_You can tell I'm a boy?_

"It's your laugh."

_Ah, I see, I see... you can't come in, by the way._

"Oh? And why's that?"

_You might be dead._

Sandor froze. Body and heart and mind. The landscape around him trembled as if it were all one leaf on a dying tree, and he tried to summon the will to... just swallow. He failed. He looked down at his hands that were untouched by blood. His armor... gods... there was the hole. Where Bolton's dagger had fucking flayed open his side, but... there was nothing. Just a hole. Black and empty and-

"L... Look, if this is my bloody dream then I want-"

 _It's not **your** dream_ , the voice said, and Sandor could hear the impatience grow. _It's not even **a** dream. Have you ever seen this place? No. I have. That's why you're here. Because I brought you here. I spoke to you before when you had the root and sap and life of the weirwood inside you, bringing you closer to me. But I couldn't speak to you after that. Until you were wounded, I assume quite badly. You would not have shone so bright nor floated so far from the real otherwise. So I found you and brought you here. But dead men cannot enter the caves. Corpses, souls... it doesn't matter._

Sandor frowned, and some childish impulse overrode him as he snapped, "Why can't I?"

 _I don't know!_ Ah, there was that boyish anger he'd been waiting for, snapping and snarling. _I don't know **why** things are, just that they **are**. And one of them is you cannot enter, but we can talk._

Sandor crossed his arms in the space before the cave and tried to look as comfortable as a man could in weather that could freeze a goat's balls off. So, he was dying, or dead, or... in-between, or whatever. And he couldn't come back from it?

_You can, yes. I said "might be", remember? But that all depends on who they have tending you in the real, and how tough you are, I suppose._

"Pretty damn tough."

_So has said every man doomed to die before a battle, I'd think. We're wasting time._

"To do what?"

_Sansa. It is about Sansa. Sandor! Focus on me! On my words!_

Her fingertips on him when they woke-

The scent of her after a bath-

The bell-and-bird-call of her laughter-

When she touched his face and his scars melted and his heart was not some blackened, useless thing-

All his fear and the futures he'd prayed for to gods he hated-

_Sandor! Stop it!_

He breathed in hard and all the whirling memories and feelings fled like ghosts banished by a seer. Sandor coughed and struggled and went down to his knees. The ground undulated and boiled under him, yet it was still solid... even as he saw his own fingers wriggle likewise, just for a moment, and then still.

"What... Wh-"

_I told you already! Gods, man, don't you listen?!_

"Who the fuck are you and-"

_I was her brother!_

Again he froze. Almost as much as he did when the voice, the brother, the tree and whatever the hells else he was, told him he was hanging between worlds. He panted and jets of steam blasted into the air. He rested back, haunches on his heels, kneeling before the great yawning blackness.

"... which one?"

_My name was Brandon._

"Are you dead?"

_No. But I am not Brandon anymore._

"Boy, I have no time for sodding-

_Riddles? Sadly, that is most of what I have, Sandor. I can see... What I can see, I can't show you. It's all just... mirrors, warped by fire and cold, so what you see is what is real, but the most demented version of it._

"What did I just say?!"

_Oh, for all the... close your eyes, then!_

Grumbling and growling insane threats against a voice with no bloody body, Sandor did as he was bid and-

Gasped as the darkness lasted but a moment before-

 

a puppet of meat and wood and bone, splashed with blood from crown to toes, jerked over a fire with snow falling behind it, ice clutching the strings

 

a beast he glimpsed in flashes, wing'd and screeching, but stinking of salt and blood and anguish, chains around more than one neck and around its master who wept in a woman's voice

 

a wolf howling in the darkness, frothing and rabid and proud, circled by a thing that glided without feet and arms, a face painted to it and underneath were fangs and sorrow and rage on wet red flesh

 

a deafening roar of gleaming stones crashing down, blocks so huge and heavy that each one clashed with the other and the ground quaked and a tide of darkness flowed over it

 

a man pale as a corpse with a broken sword that burned, raising it high and a snarling shadow shirked and roared as hissing reptile screams joined it

 

Sandor's eyes snapped open and he was back in the world but the world was not with him. It flailed and stabbed at his eyes, the mountains seemed to wail and tremble against the sky and the tree was bending on itself. The cave shimmered and shrunk and finally he closed his eyes again, shook his head-

 

a giant of melting metal with foulness leaking from its helm, standing before a smirking-

 

_Sandor? Listen to me. Breath. Think of somewhere safe-_

 

a great and impossible mouth that sucked in light and spewed out darkness, closing over-

 

a girl crying and pleading with someone, begging her father-

 

_Sandor! Think of somewhere safe! You have to-_

Clegane screamed at the shapes and visions and shadows and they shattered and he flew away from them as if he had wings. Rocketed up into the darkness like he would break the stars from the skies and thought back, past Sansa and the Red Keep and burning green fire and lizards and tunnels until he was-

Awake. Gasping. In a warm stone room with a covered fireplace, flames glowing and flickering behind it, firewood hissing and clicking. A low sound... humming... a sound so light and yet when Sandor heard it he felt his knees crumble and he turned to the bed. He never thought he'd hear it again, not from that throat, and the words drifted back from his childhood like those days were but moments ago.

_Cry not, my maid,_

_I'll carry you from here,_

_On my steed and with speed,_

_To the healing spring._

_O we'll dance in the water,_

_O we'll laugh on the shore,_

_Cry not, my maid,_

_This I vow, this I swear,_

_Thou shalt ache no more._

The girl had not seen even eight namedays. Little feet kicking up in the air as she lay on her front and read by the light of a candle. Straight black hair, normally impeccably brushed and braided, was rebelliously loose around her shoulders. He stirred one toe and a floorboard creaked. She turned and the grey eyes of himself and his father and _her_ looked back at him. For a moment Sandor thought to cover his face, plant both his hands over it so she couldn't see the monster in her room, and he chided himself because this _isn't fucking real_ but he still couldn't bear to see her face collapse in fear, would rather go back-

She didn't. She grinned up at him and bounced off the bed. Made of rubber and excitement and all the good things life kills. 

She was light as a Summer breeze and yet Sandor felt struck by an ox when she wrapped her arms around his waist.

"Hello, big brother."

 

**SANSA**

Hundreds had died to give her this moment. On both sides, it was easily thousands. The halls and courtyards and battlements and rooms of Winterfell were littered with dead, some places so thick that there was no floor, just corpses and hewn parts and pools of blood. An hour after the last resistance had ended, Sansa had listened to screaming men put to death even as they lay, and then after that there was a constant massed groaning from the First Keep, where the wounded had been moved to.

Lord Wylis. Mors Umber. Hother Umber. Young Flint.

Theon. Cold blue face with a smile etched onto it, and despite everything he'd done, Sansa had hoped he carried that still satisfaction with him to the place his god slumbered. 

Many more. Multitudes. Hundreds of faces she would never commit to memory nor expunge. Every place of memory she had from her childhood was now marred with death. It would take days just to drag all the bodies from them all and gouge graves into the iron earth, or just burn them all far from where she stood.

The Great Hall. The high ceilings and stone buttresses. The tapestries that were so few but because they _were_ few, all had some meaning. Some import for her house. Half of them had been burned; fuel for fires. Tables hacked apart for wood. The floors had been scrubbed but Sansa knew the reek of dried blood would linger for weeks. Maybe longer. Yet blood would wash away, tapestries could be replaced, along with tables and chairs...

The seat of her father was still there. Would always be there, as long as Winterfell stood. 

Sansa had walked past ranks of her cheering supporters and sat on that high-backed chair, and felt something imbue within her. Some sense of purpose aside from herself that settled over her bones and drew up her chin sharply. 

She became Lady Stark, and smiled at the joyous faces. At her left, King Stannis sat, dressing tight over the stump where his left arm had been, face even more pinched and pale than usual, aged ten years over the last handful of days, but his fire and grit and iron had not been touched. Lord Wyman was at her right, flushed with his own survival but eyes hollow at what his victory had cost him. 

The cheers had washed over them, from White Harbor knights and Umber giants and Wolfswood clansmen and a dozen houses that nearly wept with relief and love. Sansa had wished to hold onto that moment. It had been so long in coming and she had dreamed of it, but now it came, there was no manged face with loving eyes to share it with her.

And the clamor of battle was soon replaced with a different breed of warfare. 

"Your Grace, there has been extensive damage to the castle, and we need many days to repair-"

"You forget, Lord Mormont, that Ramsay Bolton still holds the Dreadfort with hundreds of men. He will not stand idle when he learns his lord and father has been slain. We need to root him from his hole with all haste."

 _Before he can take out his vengeance on Rickon_ , Sansa added silently. 

"What can he do?" Lord Wyman's voice came out in a low wheeze, breathy and pained and not carrying beyond their dais, but his words were easier, it seemed. More solid. "He has... no allies, Your Grace. We lost many taking Winterfell but... but we gained the North. He is alone. His... His Lannister friends cannot help him. He has... no ships to flee and... and the Dreadfort is all the land... he holds."

It was a seat of power, a throne though she was not true royalty, but all Sansa felt now was exposed. Like the throngs silent before her could see every trace of her discomfort. She didn't care for the politics nor the logistics. Only the time. Every day, every hour they delayed, her brother was left to the mercies of a thing that did not even understand the word. She wanted him back. But it was not so simple.

"Lord Manderly," Lady Jonelle said, leaning closer so her voice would not be easily heard. "He has Lady Stark's brother. We cannot abandon him to-"

"Ravens have been sent, Jonelle," Wyman murmured back, eyes eager to appease but eyes unwavering. "And he must reply. Returning the... the boy, is his only hope to live."

"All the more reason for us to leave now and apply additional pressure."

"And what of Moat Cailin? Bolton men still hold it, and thus strangle the Neck, denying us access to the Kingdoms."

"What care is that to us? We don't need the kingdoms, not when ironborn and Boltons still lurk in our own. They've not the number to make a sortie against us, and I'd wager House Reed would give them a nasty surprise if they tried-"

"Then again I say we should lay siege to the Dreadfort and by taking it remove the Bolton threat entire."

"Your Grace, we _need_ to refortify this stronghold. If what you say is true, north of the-"

"Careful, my lord."

There was no threat in Stannis' tone but Lord Hornwood's mouth snapped shut all the same. The lords of the Northern houses had been informed the previous night of the message from Maester Aemon, and Sansa had been there through the long hours as Stannis and she and the surviving Umbers and Stormland lords had impressed on them exactly what was approaching. But to tell all? That was too great a risk.

 _Unity first, then transparency_ , Sansa though, thanking Baelish again for teaching her such useful if rare words. _When the North is ours entire, then we can turn it to defence._

She noted with some satisfaction that the distrusting glint in Stannis' eyes had faded a fraction when speaking to Hornwood. He and Dustin and Tallhart, Ryswell and Stout... they had all been under Bolton's thumb a week before. Now they were under Stannis', and he was not a man who took well to turncloaks. Sansa could see him silently, colding toting up sins and grudges he felt would need righting some day, but they would have to wait. He was a southron surrounded by northerners, and his Stormland allies had been as mauled as the rest of them. 

Rickon. The name and the face it belonged to echoed through her. Winterfell was taken. The great battle of the North, she believed, and her side had won it. But without Rickon safe in his home, it was nothing to her.

Just as the hall filled with hundreds was empty without _him_. 

Selfish whim drove her up from her seat and after a moment a dozen sets of surprised limbs jerked bodies upright in her wake. Hands folded across her lap as she stood, Sansa nodded to either side of her and intoned with a voice she hoped her mother would approve of.

"My lords... my ladies... you know my thoughts on the matter. Winterfell is ruined in many quarters. Her stores are depleted. Her people are either dead or fled or starving. Repairs must be made and new defences raised. When this is done, we can turn our mind to other things. I know that will not be long coming."

Stannis ground his teeth for a few moments, then spoke with them still together. She knew his arm still pained him, a lingering rot that was fading but still ached. She could only imagine the phantom tugs and tremors he still felt; the constant reminder of what he'd lost to take _her_ home.

"Lady Stark, you swore your loyalty to me," he said, not mincing words nor hiding his intent in flattery. Sansa found it quite refreshing, even as the other northerners narrowed their eyes at his bluntness. "Winterfell is yours, as it should be. The Boltons within were purged and slaughtered, the handful that survived chased out into the snow along with the Freys. I have upheld my end of our bargain. Now I require your aid, and we both know it serves us both."

Sansa regarded the man coolly and decided to let him stew a moment. She knew there was much to be done in Winterfell, but in this subject, they were of like objective. Stannis wanted the last shred of the Boltons destroyed, another obstacle to his grand plans removed; she wanted her brother returned and, preferably, Ramsay Bolton's head on a spear. She looked around and caught the eye of each northern lord in turn.

Some nodded their agreement. Other nodded vaguely, urging caution. She made her decision.

"Four days," she said simply. "Time enough for additional supplies to arrive from White Harbor, as Lord Wyman's messages request, and the worst of the damages to be somewhat repaired. Then, if there is no word of surrender or parlay from the Bastard, we continue to the Dreadfort." 

She smiled coldly. A theatrical touch, mayhap, but one that her audience would appreciate and, indeed, many aped. 

"And we raze it along within the evil inside."

A chorus of voices and a round of boots and fists hammering against wood and stone, and it was done. Stannis nodded curtly and Sansa turned from him, a pair of Manderly knights smoothly falling into step behind her. She took the walk to the huge curving doors in a quick stride, nodding here and there at the feasting men. Heads bobbed obediently and there were plenty of smiles with them. Wounded men missing eyes and fingers and worse seemed to ease for a moment when she glanced their way, and for them, she always made a point to smile.

_They gave much to see me where I belong. Some may yet give more-_

The thought stabbed her in the gut like a thin dirk when she paired Sandor's face to it. Then Rickon joined it after but she held herself upright, forced steel to her spine until she was beyond the doors and then stopped... swayed...

"Lady Stark?" Ser Rufus shuffled closer to her. "Are you well?"

"Yes, I... yes."

_Lady Stark. Mistress of Winterfell._

_Start acting like it._

She grasped the words and took strength from them, even as her actions betrayed them. She couldn't sit placidly while all around her the air turned thick with intrigue, so she'd simply left. Her father would have cringed at her... abandoning, her place, in _his_ hall. _Her_ hall. But she did not care. She wanted only to lay eyes on him again, as she ate up the bloody mud with long steps and climbed the winding stairs of the maester's tower.

Luwin's tower, as was. She smiled sadly at memories of tedious arithmetic lessons, endured like a spell in the Black Cells before she could embrace "literature", which was always the book of fables and knights and fair maidens she'd brought with her. Arya had always rolled her eyes and made faces, but-

Another stab. Coming home had not healed her as she thought; it had only opened her wounds anew, and reminded her of all she had lost.

She stopped before the proper door. From others came shuffling, low moans, snores. Highborn casualties afforded more care than simple battlefield healers with dirty dressings and herbs they chewed themselves before applying. A crooked maester with a chain of copper, brass and one link of silver opened the door a crack, then spread it wide when he saw whom it was. Beyond him, Sandor Clegane filled the bed to the point she could barely see the mattress. His feet stuck over the end of it and his chest heaved.

No. That wasn't the word. It moved, but it was not the full draw that she had seen and felt those nights in their tent. 

It was weak. Clinging to life. Something she had never thought to see on his form.

"Is..." Her voice crackled and she cleared her throat. The two knights stayed their post in the hallway as she entered. "Has he... anything?"

"He still rests, my lady," the man said in a dry voice, a slight sheen of annoyance that she was bothering him yet again. "But his condition does not worsen. He moves little, and so his dressings and the stitches I have put to him do not break or move. He still keeps down food and his... private functions, are regular."

 _He should have died_ , she thinks traitorously, moving to the side of the bed. _So badly wounded. So much blood lost._

"He speaks, sometimes, when he dreams," the maester continued, as much to fill the silence as inform. "Ravings, my lady. Of no true worth. Speaking or mumbling with phantoms-"

"Anna... Anna..."

As if to give credence to the man, Sandor's voice croaked out that word. Sansa felt a flush to hear him speak, some vestige of life still in him, but... what else had he spoken of, unknowing and innocent? Had he spoken her name? How often? In what tone, and... paired to memory? She swallowed and turned to the bent figure in grey.

"I would spend a moment with him... even if he is between worlds."

"Of course, my lady. I have others to see. I will return in a quarter-hour."

He closed the door behind him and Sansa sat next to her sworn shield. The dressing covering half his bare torso was still smeared red at the side, but it wasn't soaked through as it had been before. The maester had set his jaw and stitched up that gaping wound with dogged patience, even as blood seeped from carved flesh to moving fingers to mattress and then the floor. A dozen smaller patches dotted his pale flesh, but they were not the ones killing him.

 _He is between worlds_ , she thought, before realizing she did not need to guard her thoughts.

"Sandor?" She whispered his name and took his hands. Too cold. Too still. "Sandor... I... I want you to come back. I don't have any pretty chirpings for you, my... my love."

Gods, why could she only say such things when he was so close to The Stranger? She'd thought her ow mind had cracked when he'd mumbled the word to her in the windlass chamber, sure his life was ending and uncaring for the fear she knew had held him back. He spoke the words she longed for in a place she had always feared: the place of his death. Now she swallowed and prayed again for the miraculous. 

Men died so easily. She had seen it such a hundred times. But nothing about Sandor was easy, and for once, she just wanted the damn world to acknowledge that. 

"... don't want to go..."

She frowned at his mumbles. Was he speaking to her? Of her world? Or the one he found himself in? Her thumb caressed the hair back of his hand and she shook her head.

"I don't want you to go, either," she said, stroking a few strands of coarse black hair from his pasty face. "So wake up. I know you can."

"... miss you... love you..."

Was it her he spoke of? Some shade? Another memory? Sansa's mind buzzed with questions and then she drowned them out with the simple thought that she didn't care; she heard his voice, low and fragile as it was, and that was enough. 

"I love you, too," she whispered. Her lips pressed to his cheek and she sniffed back her tears. She had soaked through her pillow the last two nights. She'd not crack and crumble here as well. "So come back. We have... There's much to do, and I need you, Sandor."

Sansa shook her head, and not just at the insanity of speaking to a man delirious and, well, _sleeping_. She truly was a lady of Winterfell now; a lord without a cock between her legs, with half the North pledged to her and a king-to-be clamoring for her aid. She had rations and repairs to oversee and a legion of smallfolk in the Winter Town to protect from the coming ice. A hundred priorities, all jostling for her attention and all claiming they needed it most. 

Yet she was here. With a man neither a lord nor kin nor even upright. Selfish. Girlish. Foolish.

"You promised me," she said, and the tears came. "You never lied before. Don't start n-"

There was no drama. No bards nor minstrels marking the moment. No great rush of waking air nor tearing off his dressings. Nothing so... sensational. But she knew what she saw, and thought again of miracles.

Sandor opened his eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoyed the acid trip. All of those allude to incoming shizz. Enjoy!


	34. Chapter 34

**SANDOR**

He knew she was confused and gods knew he didn't want to scare her, but she had to wriggle like a fishing worm before Sandor realized he was squeezing her too hard.

"Sandy?!"

"I'm..." Even that name, the only pet name he'd ever had, was like a lance through his chestbone. Dog, Hound, cur, mongrel... all from wormy lips with green eyes and blonde hair. Never from blood. Never with affection and that lilt that made his name sound like a swing she could play on. "Sorry, Anna. It's just... You're..."

She quirked an eyebrow and gave him an indulgent smile. He was studying her like she was a walking fabrication, as if he could look close enough and see the strings on her limbs. She looked so much... like _her_. Acted it, too. 

"... in my room?

"No. I mean, I know, but... don't you remember... what-"

"Sandor? I wouldn't."

Now the voice had a _direction_ to it, and that meant-

Sandor turned and saw a boy there, only he wasn't a boy. Not really. 

"Gods-"

"Sandy, what's that-Sandy?!"

He stood up and faced this "Brandon" and tucked her behind him with one arm, already thinking without hesitation if it was possible to kill someone who wasn't just _in_ your dream but had _made_ your dr-

"I told you already," the boy said, taking a step forward on feet that were withered and twisted, pale and strong, gnarled and brown and crackled like bark. "This isn't a dream. It's something else."

"A... A memory?"

"Sandy, I want to see-"

" _Stay there_ , Anna!"

"It could be." The boy who was warping and twisting before him didn't sound... well, no, actually he _did_ sound like a boy. His voice was the only thing that Sandor thought was normal. He was tired and wanted Sandor to understand things he could not and he _didn't_ have all the answers. "I don't know, Sandor. It could be a memory, the safe place I told you to find, away from the visions. It could be when you called out, you... went beyond the place in-between. Maybe went beyond living."

There was no noise save for the crackling fire and the whip-snap of bark consumed by it. Sandor swallowed so hard it almost hurt and felt tiny, soft fingers clutch at his arm. The boy could see some decision brewing in his eyes, some awful want he'd buried so long, the kind of yearning that made a man forsake everything. 

"I don't want to go," Sandor said, and his growl came out higher at the end, almost a plea. He planted his feet squarely and looked around at what he thought in that moment might be his own personal afterlife. "I want to stay. With her."

The boy who had been Brandon Stark sighed and hung his head, crowned with billowing brown hair despite the fact there was no breeze, though it thickened and hardened into branches and leaves and then blew apart to tangled, boyish strands once again. His face looked like a tree wearing a mask and then the opposite. Sandor could barely look at it, but the eyes were... filled with sorrow. Sorrow enough for him and for his sister and his _own_ sister and everyone else.

"If you stay," he said eventually, grinding out the words like he didn't want to, "I do not think Sansa will survive this Winter."

Blood Sandor knew he didn't really have drained out of his face in a twinkling. His guts turned to stones, still and cold and heavy. Annalyn gasped behind him and it was long moments before he felt her tugging on his arm.

"Sandy...? Sandy...?"

"Wh... What?"

"Who is Sansa?"

He never took his eyes off the boy. His eyes stabbed through the torpid illusion that never stayed a form, flexed and pulsed now and then as if in pain, like maintaining even one facsimile of shape was agony. Tried to find the lie in his words...

"You... You don't know that."

"I know what I see," Brandon said simply and sadly, as if he wished he were blind. Often he did. "And I see horrors and trials for her the likes she has not yet f-" another spasm of pain and a flash of light within him, like a sun blooming in his chest "-faced. I gave you... visions, Sandor. Showed you the future as could be, as might be. She will need what I showed you, and she will need you, besides. Your strength and your courage. Your l-loyalty and skill."

"It was gibberish! Madness!"

"It was _truth!_ And I do not get to decide _how_ you see it!" The silken wisps of bark and flesh and leaf flew from him and there was the boy, as he was, as he existed in darkness and roots. Wasted and waxen. Every rib and angle of his bones visible. Face shrunken and eyes... white as polished marble. Sightless to the waking world, but piercing in this one. "Look upon me, Sandor Clegane. See what I have _done_ to myself, _solely_ to give aid to the ones I love."

Sandor stared and stared and the emaciated child drew again into himself. Became the shifting monster of tree and shade. He panted and Sandor felt his own breath coming out in fits. This was... this was too much. He was back before the weirwood in Greywater Watch, broken and unbelieving. But it had been words spoken without tongue that saw him rise. Brandon's words, as now he knew them. He turned and beheld his sister.

"She's the woman I love."

Annalyn's face lit up like a castle's worth of torches and she made that queer, singular squeaking sound he remembered that drew a smile to his lips that almost all else could not. 

"Is she pretty? Is she a fair maiden, like in the books?"

"Yes, minnow," he said, and his name for her caught in his throat and he felt his eyes sting. "Beautiful and fair and she... still needs me. Away from here."

Her smile dimmed but did not fully drop. Ever the happy child. Sandor felt black, boundless rage well within him anew, but it was not the beast he knew so well. It came with sorrow and tears and hatred that could drive a man for years. Anger at the whole fucking world for anointing a monster in holy oils and calling him "Ser", then letting him destroy his own little sister, barely up to his thigh, just because... because...

Sandor didn't even know. He never had. He never _wanted_ to. Because if he did, he would be able to ken some part of Gregor's mind, and he would rather lose his mind than do that.

"Will I see you again?"

He bent to one knee on the stone floor that even smelled of the same dust and dried soap he remembered. He put a hand on her shoulder and felt that warm, vital life he'd been robbed of. His lips smiled, scarred half and all, and tears ran into the corners of his mouth.

"You will, Anna. One day. I miss you so much," he choked out the last two words and hugged her tightly, so she wouldn't have the last sight of him be his face torn and red with weeping. "I love you, Anna. I'm... I'm so sorry."

Her hands were like feathers or leaves on his back, and yet he felt every inch of them. Every scrap of warmth, armor be damned. She was everything he remembered and all he couldn't but knew he should; as if his memories had been locked away and Brandon had thrown open the vault to bring them back to him. She shushed him like she did when his face had been swaddled in bandages and he'd screamed for an hour when they'd first been removed and a mirror shoved in front of him. He smelled her hair, almonds and lavender soap, and the hint of pine that told him she'd been rooting around outside again when her septa wasn't watching.

He'd never watched her grow. Never scared the shit out of boys who tried to court her, or taught her to ride and hunt. The life they should have had as siblings was stolen from him and all Sandor had was a frozen moment in a place he'd never understand.

He held tight to her until he felt he could let go, and his words came with his eyes shut.

"Will I... Will I remember? The visions?"

"You will, Sandor," Brandon said, not daring to approach, voice soothing and low. "But it will be for you to make sense of them, however you can. There is a vast stage of many levels at play. Far larger than Winterfell and you and her. I have others to see. More wisdom to try and impart. It... well... you have seen me. It takes another shred of whom I was with every journey, but we must sacrifice. All of us."

Something trembled in the last words he spoke but Sandor was too wrapped up in Annalyn to hear it. Instead he took a deep shuddering breath and opened his eyes, staring over her thin shoulder at the book on the bed.

A maiden with red hair. Playing with a great, black but smiling hound. 

"Send me back," he whispered, kissing his sister's hair. "Gods damn you, send me-"

There was force between under him, above him, around him, forcing him from Annalyn and he fought against it out of instinct. But in a blink she was gone, with the room and the fire and the bed and the book and the strange boy who was now something far more and far less than Brandon Stark. Sandor was in a vast ball of burning light and he knew, or some hidden part of his mind that could navigate this... place. Yes. It was a _place_ , not a _thing_ , and he was flying, hurled towards a brighter light and squeezed through it-

All of what he was in memory and body clattered and slammed into his mind at once and a kaleidoscope of pains and aches set his skin on fire within a moment. He breathed in and his ribs dug into his guts. His side screeched from his leg to his shoulder and he felt dressings, sticky ointment, soaked seats and gods were his feet hanging off the-

Sandor opened his eyes, and she was there. 

"San-San-"

His voice was weak, words rustling from lips so parched and dry they were like old parchment. "I had to come back."

 

 

**SANSA**

Maester Varun sputtered and babbled and spewed words so much that she was sure some inner plumbing in the old man had just gone ahead and burst. When Sansa called him his face was bland and tired but seeing Sandor awake, holding weakly onto Lady Stark's hand, it was like something large and painful had been swiftly inserted in him. He bustled and crab-walked awkwardly around the bed too big for the room, grabbing dressings and ointment, putting them down, dropping them, grabbing other things, jabbering and spewing words as fast as his hands lost and gained implements.

"Not logical, not logical at all-"

"Can't believe it. Must have... no, couldn't have-"

"Strong as an ox. Or a mage. No, something-"

"They won't believe it. Oh, I'll tell 'em, but-

" _Gods_ , man," Sandor finally growled, but only the first half of his words held strength. Sansa winced as his voice harsh and firm dissolved into a dry, racking cough that set the whole bed trembling. She reached out without thinking, trying to steady shoulders far broader than her own with hands far weaker, feeling only the trembles and quaking of a body still far from healed. "Lemme... just... fucking lie here..."

Varun gave him a sour look but said no more. Sansa did her best to win him over, as seemed to be her role in their affairs. She smiled politely at the maester as the men screwed his lips into a tight white line, patting the healer's hulking patient's shoulder.

"Maester, I thank you for your wisdom. My sworn shield is most useful to my house, and thanks to you, he can still serve myself, my house, the North and King Stannis. His waking words are clearly of no import, I pray you. I am sure he has gratitude for the man who saved his life."

"Wasn't fuckin' _him_ , believe me..."

Now lady and maester turn to him with their brows furrowed, but Sandor just looked at his pillow and ignored them both. Waits it out. Sansa cleared her throat and plastered the smile back onto her face. Varun may have been too old to be swayed by flattery, but generous words from a lovely young lady can lighten the heart of any man of any year, and eventually he gave a proud smile.

"I am happy to have been of service, my lady."

"I am sure," Sansa said, trying to keep the triumph out of her smile. "Now, if you would excuse us for a moment?"

"My lady, your shield still needs to have his-"

"I am sure there is much to be done," Sansa said smoothly, wide eyes and soft smile as practiced as Sandor's sword swings. "Which is why it will only be a moment. Please...?"

She'd learned young that when a highborn said "please", it was really just good manners. As a child, that had seemed right and proper to her; growing older, she saw it to be no less an application of fear and force than holding a knife to a man's throat. But now she understood it was just another weapon; one that was simply more genteel. She was the Lady of Winterfell, and he was a maester with a short chain who Stannis had brought from the Wall, hardly an illustrious posting. She was being _polite_ , not offering a subject of debate.

"A moment, my lady..." 

He bowed again and Sansa thought he slowed for a moment as he reached the door. Sandor's eyes followed the man, and just before the door creaked close a second time, they narrowed. Even wounded and bled half-out onto stone and sheets, his glare still smouldered and threatened bloody deeds. Sansa snorted softly. He was alive. What state and what mood that liveliness took, she did not care for the moment.

"Cunt watches things too closely."

"He's a maester; it's his purpose."

"Watches _you_ too closely, then."

"You think _everyone_ watches me too closely."

"Most of 'em d-o-o-o-"

Again his voice shattered and his shoulders bobbed and shook. Sansa bit her bottom lip and poured him some water as she heard the wetness clog his throat. The world was not as it should be, and she did not like it. Sandor was never weak like this; even when he'd been riddled with fever at Greywater Watch, he'd had some mad strength roiling under his skin. But now, so pale and thinner from days without food or walking...

_He is a man. He is mortal. Punch enough holes in a man, cleave off enough flesh, he'll die. The Mountain died. So can his brother._

"Not today."

"Wh-What was that?"

"Nothing. Drink this."

She held the cup to his lips and made sure she was slow in tipping up the end. A dribble still trickled into his beard but at least he wasn't choking on something else. He licked his lips and his eyes found hers over the rim of the glass.

Molten lead in that ravaged, exhausted, stolen-from-The-Stranger face. They hadn't dimmed along with his body, and even now she felt the heat pulse off them... and despite her own pooling low in her belly, she couldn't help but cock a mocking eyebrow. Just as she couldn't help the proud, hopeless smile. Scant minutes after waking from the slumber that should have been his last, in a body mangled as if he'd been in a melee with giants, and Sandor's first straight thoughts were directed by his cock. 

"Sandor, if we tried anything now, it would probably kill you."

"Aye, but I can..." He swallowed the cough that time, battering his body back under control. "... think of no... better way to go."

She rolled her eyes and she was a girl again, foisting off flowery overtures from smooth-skinned and slick-tongued youths. Sandor grinned weakly and Sansa thought not a one of them could hold a candle to his storm. He'd probably never worn a silk shirt nor oiled and coiffed his hair; never taken a bath that didn't involve pure cleanliness and hygiene issues. Cared nothing for golden or shining white armor, just his clattering, scuffed, scraped and aged black mail-and-plate suit.

Sansa thought it again. Not a candle. Not even for a moment. And she meant it.

She stared at his face, craggy and fully bearded now, thanks to days unconscious and bedridden. Her eyes roved over the half that was so cruelly abused, forever shattered and hideous and drawing the fear of the world with but a glance. A thousand instant opinions and all of them wrong. She had been one of them, and now?

"Don't scare me like that again."

She whispered the words. She held his hand and he squeezed it back, not half as strong as normal but it was there, answering her touch. The Stranger had come so close that time. Two days he'd been just a snoring, moaning lump of sleeping meat, shitting and pissing onto sheets that took four men to change under him, bleeding and soaking dressings... and Sansa didn't have a clue when he'd be fit to even _walk_. She thought of the lizard-lion in the marsh; the Blackwater; the frozen field and whatever black, blurry hell that had seen him to the Quiet Isles and a limp he would never fully lose. 

_Those are only the ones you know of._

"Didn't have much of a choice, little hawk," he murmured, as if he understood her caution for the healer most likely lurking behind the door. "Everything work out as expected?"

She wanted to tell him all, to volley news at him and fill his ears so he would not feel so blind to time's passing and he could give his gruff, curt advice. But she reined back on the impulse, shaking her head and adding her other hand to the top of the one clutching hers, rubbing slow circles.

"Not now, my wolf," she said slyly, giving him his own name, freshly minted and gods, he was well enough it seemed there was enough blood in him to rush to his cheeks. "You've barely awake. Your mind is probably muddled. Rest, eat, recover. I will come later. I promise."

She held her breath. Her eyes slid to the door. No noise behind it, no shuffling of robes or scrape of leather soles. No shadow barring the light from under it...

He had enough time to frown before she turned back to him and pressed a hard, claiming kiss on his lips. She breathed in as she did, as if she wanted his scent in her lungs as well, taking in as much of him in as many senses. Sandor may have been weak, but his damn lips could still work, and he did, careful not to beak contact too long lest their wet, wrestling mouths make some noise-

-and then, with a low, frustrated, _mournful_ growl that made his eyes pop because hells and fuckery, it almost sounded like _him_... she pulled away. Lips fat and swollen. She ran the tip of her tongue over them and he fisted the spread in one hand until his knuckles were... well, they were already white.

"Still tastes like you, my wolf."

"Girl," he rasped, so low and fierce she felt it tremble from her head down to her core and light afire everything in between. "As soon as I'm sodding fit for it..." 

Sansa twisted her lips to one side and composed a few choice rejoinders, but gods knew she didn't need him raising a tower under his covers and getting the maester wondering. So she bit her lip and, of course, that hardly helped. Instead she squeezed his hand one more time and kissed his forehead, whispering against his ear.

"We'll see. Rest, my love. I have much to tell you."

_Rickon. Dreadfort. Repairs. Recruitment. Revenge. Restoration._

So Sansa was more than a little surprised when a hard, hunted look glowed briefly in Sandor's eyes and he pressed his lips to the back of her hand, like a knight of eyes. But when he opened them again as she stood up, and he let go, and she peered deep and curious. The flickering candles were scattered in just the right places to light almost all the room, as befit the place of a maester: illumination in all corners, but not at the expense of risking fire and ruin to the parchment scattered around them. 

So she could see clearly as his molten eyes were thrown into a trough and forged into some sharp and dangerous. One would not have thought that unusual for Sandor Clegane, but Sansa knew him too well by that time. There was a warning in there. Of something great and terrible. Her breath caught. Deadly urgency soaked his tone to match the words that would haunt her until they spoke again. Because it was impossible and foolish and went against everything she knew he believed.

_But a dog does not lie._

"You're not the only one."

 

**STANNIS**

"You are certain of what you saw?"

"They were as close to me as I am to you, Your Grace, and my eyes and ears are not so decrepit as to deceive me."

"What you speak of is most distasteful, maester. If there is a chance you ply my with a falsehood, I swear you will find your end on the Red God's pyre." 

He expected that to make a dent in the old man's expression, but save for a glimmer of panic rushing across his wrinkles, there was none. Maester Varun simply narrowed his eyes a little more and kept his stare steady. The shadows behind the stable were deep and stinking, a perfect place to meet with privacy, and yet Stannis could see the vague glint of steely eyes through them. The voice that spoke again matched it.

"You instructed me to report things of note that you heard. I have done so. I have been right. I am doing so _now_."

"This is not soldiers pilfering purses or rations," Stannis said back calmly, lowering his voice for the last, more important part of his statement. "This is a highborn lady ruining her house in the bed of a lowborn drunk no better than a sellsword." 

"I know what it is, Your Grace."

"Then you know to speak of it only if you are certain." Not a question, and he didn't phrase it as such. "So why, I ask myself, would you lie to me?"

That made him pause. Twin glints flickered and Stannis knew they rested on the still, silent shapes of the two knights at the entrance to the stables. Stormland men, devout in both their loyalty to him and their faith to R'hllor. They'd not speak a word of what occurred here tonight, whether it was just words exchanged or Stannis running the old man through. Or telling them to do it. Stannis watched the man carefully, trying to find in eyes alone some evasion or lurking lie but...

"I would not, for there is nothing to be gained. If I speak true, I serve your ends, as I always have. If I lie, then I do so towards the ruin of Lady Stark and the weakening of your alliance with the Northerners. But why would I do that? The Boltons are broken. The Lannisters are half a country away and embroiled in their own conflicts."

"There are others."

"None with power here." That came back sharply, as if rehearsed, and Stannis' perpetual frow deepened a touch. He _was_ dealing with a maester, after all. Rhetoric and negotiation were part of their training, and their tutelage. "None but Your Grace and his men, and House Stark and their allies, and if I was loyal only to the latter, I would have kept my teeth together, would I not?"

Stannis made no sound for a moment, save for the rote, mechanical sucking and blowing of his breath. He wanted to fold his arms. No, he didn't even feel the want: his arms moved of their own accord towards their favored placing, but of course, it was no longer plural. The arm he had left moved his hand up to his armpit as if to scratch it, and once again, Stannis was damn surprised to find no partner to it.

_Memory lives in muscle, even those cast from you. It will take time and application to quash that._

"Fine answer. Continue your vigilance, maester. You may go."

The grey-robed man bowed and turned and Stannis could hear the swish and drag of its hem in mud and shit and straw, but not see him against the shadow. It didn't bother him. There was another man in there with them, who arrived before their rendezvous and had taken up his hide. Stannis was intimately aware of assassination: he'd used it as a scalpel against his enemies, rather than the sword and lance and maul of his army. His spy left smartly, he thought. No groveling or declarations of continued loyalty; no tentative mention of reward or favor for his services. He was clever enough to play the long game, and that made him valuable. 

King Stannis stood in silence for a while. The sounds of a castle at rest thrummed and called out and murmured around him, but he just stood there, one remaining arm flexing at his side. His mind was a rush and whirl, though. Turning over what the robed man had told him. Lady Sansa's twice- or even thrice-daily visits to her sworn shield. The manner in which she'd stroked his sleeping forehead or pressed his hand with hers. The way she'd held it - and he had done likewise - when he had awoken, and the look they had shared when Varun had been ostensibly pottering around them. 

 _Tenderness_. That was the man's word. Many would have thought Stannis, the cold and dour Baratheon brother, incapable of divining anything from that. They would be wrong. All of it added up to... something that made his jaw clench and his fist tighten. Tenderness. Care. A connection of hearts. Gods, Selyse had her flaws but he thanked whichever of them that mattered that she had not been afflicted by that softness of heart that apparently plagued Sansa Stark.

 _Love_ , he thought with distaste. _The death of duty, isn't that how it goes? She stands astride the North like the Titan over the entrance to Braavos, yet she would throw herself at a murderer and a pillager. Brother of The Mountain. That blood does not lie, and it would taint her. And her house. And myself._

His brow furrowed over stony eyes, staring into nothing and possible futures both. Lady Stark's hand in marriage could be a powerful weapon if wielded at the right time. It could - no, it _would_ \- grant an alliance any of the Southern houses would jump at, her allegiance to him be damned. Her loyalty to to him meant their loyalty to him, chains of matrimony and with them influence, finance, armies and levies and... and _Sandor Clegane_ would stand before that? The Hound? 

"Unacceptable."

He spoke that one word as if it explained all and would condone everything after. His mind was made, and the decision would not be regretted. Sansa Stark was too important to be wasted, and he had lost too much to allow some untitled, landless ruffian to destroy the potential her house resurgent offered him. The length of empty air where his arm should have been tingled impossibly and Stannis swallowed a touch harder than a moment earlier. Too much given already. A king who fought his own wars was only half a man with half his gods-given arms, and already he knew that weakness would become apparent. News of it would spread. Sansa Stark was more necessary than ever.

 _Another piece on the board. She has forgotten her duty, and her place._ He sighed, and a fragment of sentiment scented it, but no more. _Would I let Shireen make such a choice? No. Not for the sake of her girlish heart; not when the strength of her family and her kingdoms were in doubt. Sansa is no different. If her father were alive..._

But he was not, he reminded himself. He supposed he should have expected this unseemly development, if only for the rebellious spirit of her usurper brother. But he'd seen the stolen looks and glances that no mere sworn shield would dare make to his lady. Stannis shuddered inwardly at the possibility that the deformed ape had taken her maidenhead. Then things would become much more... tenuous.  

He turned his head towards the door of the stables and glared at the high Maester's Turret. Candles glowed in the windows, dull but catching his eye in the deep darkness of night. He wondered which one was Clegane's. For a moment he thought of how guarded he was, how easy it would be to-

_No. She would know it was murder, and this place is too packed with Northmen loyal to her for it to pass unnoticed. No, something else. Something more courtly._

Stannis turned on his heel and walked from the stables. His guards followed. The third would leave soon after, unseen by all but the rats and worms. The king's tread was even, swift and inexorable. Eddard Stark had failed his family and his house. Now he had failed his daughter. In lieu of her true father, Stannis would have to ensure that his Sansa was properly instructed, and best used. If that meant breaking her girlish heart and... removing, her sworn shield from her side, Stannis would see it happen. Too much was at stake for him to allow otherwise.

 _I play for kingdoms and crowns and the salvation of Westeros against an endless darkness, Lady Stark,_ he thought as he passed the First Keep where she slept, and flicked a glance that way. _Next to that, your affections are as naught. You will come to see the wisdom of that sacrifice._   


	35. Chapter 35

**QUEEN SANSA**

The North paused nor stopped for anyone, and as Queen, she had her duty to it. Sansa had learned that simple fact long ago, and decided it was only as bitter as she allowed it to be. Had she not _chosen_ this title, after all? But claiming the crown and the power meant enduring the protocol and tedium that went with them. She knew that she could have someone else wade through the morass she found herself in, but most days Sansa enjoyed keeping her fingers close to the pulse of her kingdom. Land disputes, estate holdings, trade agreements, marriages, a plethora of petitions from lowborn and highborn, they all flooded into Winterfell on cawing wings, clamoring for attention.

That day she needed solace, more than a reminder of her duty.

A fresh batch of letters arrived, curled parchment like neat little pig tails poured onto one side of the desk. The Queen took a sip of wine and it was quiet in her solar save the diligent scrape of her quill. Another inheritance dispute from White Harbor; gods, hadn't she resolved that a season ago? Willas would need to be informed when he returned.

The careful scratching ceased. Willas. His letter was in there, somewhere. His elegant curving hand making her smile along with his fine, glowing words, telling her of Highgarden and her good-family, still playing the game.

But the smile was always erased moments later. Like bait that drew the shield down from her heart, and then the truth was ready to plunge deep into it.

She shook her head and a brief red halo fluttered around her. Gods, she needed to focus! She finished her correspondence to Lord Wyman and sprinkled sand on the ink, a miniature rainstorm beating out on the parchment. She sealed it tight with neat, practiced fingers, a gob of wax and her seal.

Again she smiled, but this time it did not fade. The howling direwolf of her clan, fur spiked and shaggy on the molding. Known in all the kingdoms and beyond as the eternal sigil of the North and everything it represented. Sansa put the letter to one side to let the wax cool, along with a package of others. A page would come later but it was still early, and she had...

"Angus?" She said as she unfurled a fresh message on rougher paper. The balding servant in the corner, trawling through a minor mountain of miscellaneous correspondence, looked up curiously, brown eyes tired from having to scribble so small but still bright for his queen. "How many ravens today?"

"Thirty-three, your majesty."

"Urgh!" More noise than needed or felt, and it drew a smile from the man, as intended. Sansa shook her head as she began reading. "Mayhap I will need to employ an assistant for my _assistant_ , if..."

Her voice trailed off and Angus' smile drooped then the curve became a flat, serious line. Queen Sansa's blue eyes shifted from hard, studious ice to sparkling azure and then something more complicated. At first he'd fancied she was... happy. Even proud, given the rise of her brow and the nod of her head, and then it seemed some new and unwanted thought barged its way into her moment and ruined it.

"Your majesty?"

"Angus, has my brother received any messages today?"

"You mean the Wolf-" Angus' voice caught and choked and then tried to fall over itself as her sharp eyes struck him. "P-Prince Rickon, y-your majesty?"

The words came out not without warmth, but slow enough for Angus to be reminded of a cat he'd seen once, batting around a mouse. "I do not recall any other within these walls, Angus."

"Y-Yes, your grace. I know not how many, but he did-"

"Bugger," the Queen muttered as her chair screeched across the stone, rising swiftly, making Angus blush on her behalf. "Then he's already making a mess of the courtyard. Angus, I am going to see my brother." She swept past him, all furious intent and rustling tresses, eyes catching him again above lips quirked at one corner. "The _Wolf Prince_."

The little man did his best to clear his throat of his entire tongue, fiddling with his quill and his face screamed ignorance of that whispered, feared and respected title.

"I-If you say so, y-your grace..."

She damn well did say so, and she damn well moved quickly, too. The parchment still fluttered in her hand, bouncing in the breeze with her gait and her journey through corridors and hallways. Servants curtsied and bowed as she past them, and for the most part she replied with a curt nod or a murmured name. But not all the time. Her eyes were bright but they were only part-focused on the stone ways before her. They read and re-read the words printed in a careful, cultured hand; the style of one who loved words and could not bare to see them ragged and ugly. 

_Your Majesty,_

_What I have long-hoped for has finally come to pass. I know not by whose grace or kind words, but I have received a summons from Oldtown. The Citadel of the Maesters wants me to visit them, so I may be inducted as a novice into their order. I am speechless, though not wordless, and have been a foolish, grinning girl for the better part of the day. I never dreamed it would happen. Whoever aided me in winning over such a hidebound horde of men, they forever have my love and gratitude._

_I would say more but this raven is young, and I cannot burden him with much. I will be arriving in Winterfell within a handful of days, on the way to White Harbor. I would be eternally grateful if I could stay for the night, and say my farewells to your good self and your noble brother. I will miss you so much during my studies, with this "Maester Marwyn" whose hand wrote my summons._

_Your loyal and affectionate servant,_

_Shireen Baratheon_

Sansa made some strangled sound somewhere between a growl and a squeak and it was all she could do not to crush the paper into a tiny ball. Gods alone knew what Rickon's letter contained, but there would be the same point to it: I am leaving the North to pursue my heart's fondest desire, and I want to say goodbye. The Queen of seven-and-twenty rubbed her forehead and felt an older and more wearied mind throbbing there. 

_Seven hells, he's going to go fucking starkers!_

She winced and felt her throat tighten at the words. Her thoughts, mayhap, but _his_ words. Not the smooth and honeyed tones of Willas, who carried all of Littlefinger's charm and not a dram, not a grain of his malevolence behind it. Not the voice of her wedded husband, who always paused before he spoke, for he wished to consider all sides of a conundrum and arrive at a fair conclusion for all. A good man. A loyal and loving man and one who have given her beautiful children.

Sansa winced again and increased her pace, forcing down the pain with the fast, angry slap of leather on flagstones, even after her footsteps almost turned to stamps and her knees trembled.

It was Sandor. His gruff growl and crude words, shorn of pretense and civility. Her mother and septa would have turned blue and fainted to hear him in her presence. Willas had frowned and gently commanded the man to "curtail your tongue, Sandor, in the presence of ladies". But he was the one she heard rasping in her ear, so loud and close she could feel the billowing heat from his breath and-

"He's gone," she whispered to herself, granting this moment alone the luxury of her pain. She was Queen. She had a family and a castle and a whole damn _kingdom_ to safeguard, doubly so now Willas was with his family for the season. She would _not_ allow past memories to cling and bring down present deeds. "He's gone and he is _not_ coming back. Make your blo... damn peace with that, girl."

Steel sang and snarled on steel beyond her thoughts and dragged her from them. At its ken the worrisome, sorrowful girl became a worrying, exasperated queen again and she rolled her eyes as-

_Damn. That sounded like Carcer. Could be Dunn, though. Not that I could ever really tell them apart..._

She strode into din outside to find Rickon Stark, prime but ambivalent heir to Winterfell and the North, was doing what he did best: waging war. Not blunted axes or wooden swords, though; that was not the Skagosi way, as he had repeatedly told her. Their warriors bore nearly as many scars from training bouts as they did true battles, and never questioned the wisdom of such practices. More blood on the mats, less in the mud, was how Rickon put it. Sansa could see the brutal logic in that, but it never ceased to make her heart race and seize when she saw him as she did now-

Barechested and scorning the cold, sweat shining on lean muscle as he swung and jabbed and kicked and blocked and parried. His two _yog sem tot_ were far larger than he and Sansa had seen them kill with the same unhesitating barbarism as she had Sandor, but it was clear to a suckling babe who held the greater skill. Twin axes whirled and chopped through the air and oft as his partners assaulted him, they were quickly on the backfoot, forced on the defensive by this boy years younger.

Sansa studied his face, though, not just his sparring form. Always there was a spark of vicious glee in her brother's eyes when he swung steel; a trait she knew from personal experience would never truly die in him. But now she wrung her hands around Shireen's letter and gulped, seeing something more.

Anger. The worst kind. The one that had no true outlet or enemy, but was directed against affairs and forces not malicious or personal and yet were. And in there very being drove one to something close to madness.

_And to violence on the sand, it turns out._

Carcer's face was already bloody; Dunn was limping and his teeth were tight in his head. Sansa felt a flush of real, physical pain when she saw Rickon himself had a red slash across one bicep, though it hindered him not an inch. She remembered the days when a master-at-arms would have been _flogged_ for drawing blood on the personage of a lord, but Rickon carried on without complaint. 

 _Because he wants the pain_ , she realized with sorrow for the fearsome warrior who would always be her little brother. _As if it will choke the one in his heart._

Carcer came in low from the side and Rickon blocked his steel, but not his foot that lashed out and forced him to employ his other ax, robbing him of both to counter Dunn-

-sliding in smoother than a man his size should have-

-and Rickon adapted on the fly, bracing a foot on Carcer's chest and launching them both backward as he pushed off, away from Dunn's warhammer studded with giant teeth-

The courtyard cooed softly as all eyes saw the Wolf Prince roll backward through the sand and come up on his feet, bent low and axes raised before his soles had even fully settled. His bodyguard-kinsmen panted and grunted, Dunn helping up his brother without even looking down. Then the master-at-arm's voice boomed out, loud enough to serve as announcement and warning both.

"Your majesty...!"

A litany of creased leather and sighing cottons greeted her as curtsies and bows were directed her way. Carcer and Dunn stood stock straight and clapped their steel over their chests in unison. A strange gesture even to other Northerners, but Sansa knew it was bone-deep in its respect. Rickon's hand wavered as if he would do the same, but then he executed a smart, low bow instead.

Sansa smiled softly, all for him. She did not want him to be that which he wasn't, but even that slight bend to the customs of his family... it gave her some pleasure. 

"Your Majesty."

Sansa rolled her eyes. Some things would not change, apparently. "Brother..."

A silence followed as she marshaled her words, wanting to pick them with care, but his eyes had already flickered to the paper in her hand. Obviously a message from a raven. He frowned minutely, unconcerned by the thin red rivulet oozing down his arm. 

"Something troubling has arrived?"

"Oh... in a manner of speaking, ah... shouldn't you see to that?" 

She nodded at the cut and unbidden Carcer lumbered over, reaching into one of his numerous pockets for a dressing and a little vial of something that could cauterize wounds and get giants drunk at the same time. Rickon returned his axes to their hoops at his hips and cocked his head at her. Just like the direwolf lounging in one corner, enjoying the Sun and wagging his tail gently. Even Shaggydog could be gentle.

"What is the matter, your-"

"Gods, Rickon, must I _order you_ to-" She stopped herself before she made the conversation about her, and not him. She cleared her throat and spoke again: "You received some ravens today, correct?"

At once his expression became guarded, even with the stinging liquid applied to his arm and then roughly dabbed and scrubbed by the stoic Carcer. Dark blue eyes like a lake at sunset hid behind his lowered eyebrows and he cast them about as if looking for shelter. Not a fool, her brother. He knew why she was there. 

"Aye, a handful."

"You know we will be having a visitor from Last Hearth?"

"Yes, I do." His tone turned almost dangerous. More bass than would have been proper for one speaking to a Queen, but since when had Rickon cared for that? _Yet more shades of the one who had left_ , she thought, then forced the unwanted whispers away. "What of her?"

Gods, _that_ nearly stung, because much as she loved her little brother, he was utterly useless when it came to his feelings for the distant Learning Lady. Both understanding them and concealing them. He radiated a restless, sullen mood as if it were armor, but Sansa knew it too well to be fooled.

"I thought you would be happy to see her again." 

Instantly she regretted her choice of words. Why would he be happy, after all? It was not just a visit; it was his last sight of her for seasons, maybe even years. Oldtown was half a world away and even a swift journey would take many days. Not to mention her studies would keep her there for years. Dead to him save mayhap for ravens and letters by rider. Rickon ground his teeth and she saw the outrage flare in his eyes. The betrayal from one who had sworn no vows nor exchanged them and yet still, _still_ he was...

"I suppose so." He turned away to inspect the fresh dressing with a quick glance. He nodded to Carcer and the hulking man nodded back, satisfied with his master's approval. "Is there anything else, sister?"

Was that an attempt at mollification? Gods, it could have been. Mayhap her little brother was seeking to learn the wars of words as well as steel, deflection and misdirection. But Sansa felt a hold in her now, that same urge to just say what she felt and let the light of day judge it. She had the chance to do so before, long before, and had not. The results were... not as expected.

"Rickon," she said lowly, hazarding a step towards him and gods, she did feel it _was_ hazardous. He was more like Shaggy now than ever, mirroring his hairy brother's sudden arousal from languid relaxation to padding over at his side. "If there is... anything you want to say to her, then-"

"And _what_ would I say, Sansa?" _Oh, now he uses my name. When he feels his heart is carved from his chest and he can't just butcher his way to victory._ "She has wanted to study with the maesters for years. She has dreamed of it. She said so, and not just-"

His words choked off. His. Rickon Stark, the Wolf Prince, who wildling children _revered_ , kneeler or not, and his words were cut off as if by an executioner's sword. He wet his lips and Sansa saw his bodyguards glance at each other. Such concern there, and it surprised her. They were killers both, and proud of it... but they loved their master. The marks on their palms were but the most obvious sign of that. But they could give no aid to this matter, and they knew it. And hated it. 

"Rickon, I only speak because I care for you, and-"

A second time he interrupted her, words like jabbing daggers. She couldn't remember the last person who'd dared to stymie her.

_Yes, you do._

"I do not wish to discuss this, Sansa. She is a friend and she will be taking shelter here before she leaves, as many friends have. I will treat her with courtesy and respect, as I have them." Gods, the bitterness leaked from his words so thick she was sure it would dribble down his chin. "And then I will wish her farewell."

"And if your words could sway her?" She pressed on, and was unafraid to do so. Gods, fucking men and the fucking stoppers they fastened over their feelings! "Would you speak them? Or always regret you did not?"

"She does-not-want-" 

He started so strong but once again, he faltered. Like he was flailing in waters alien to him. His hands grasped the heads of his axes and Sansa could see him slipping away retreating behind the wildling and leaving the rest of him to die. 

"She wants _this_ ," he finally said, so soft and low it was almost mournful. "She'll fill her head with yet more wisdom and get her chain links and even those ugly things ill look so fucking _pretty_ on her. She'll be happy."

He almost meant it. He spoke the truth and he wished her happiness and still Sansa raised a hand as if to cup that stubble-flecked cheek. But the words did not match his eyes. There was more than one truth, as both they knew, and he was denying one to see the other to fruition. Prompted by her movement, his eyes flashed to hers and the same thought seemed to pass between them, as it does in that infallible, intangible way of siblings, however long-separated. 

_She could be happy here. With you._

"Rickon... you have to tell her-"

That was too far. She'd pushed and prodded and she'd forgotten she was not talking to the boy she'd known. Gods, she'd had long enough to come to terms with that. Yet when his eyes met hers again they were burning and angry and his words held no bar. 

" _You_ are not one to lecture _me_ on what _needs to be told_."

Sansa's jaw dropped and then snapped shut with the regal, icy fury she'd become famed for. Her eyes swam for an instant, shocked, hurt, even afraid, as if even the hint of a suggestion of the truth was enough to drive her to tears. She saw the regret in his eyes but it was hidden and dwarfed behind his anger. He was breathing heavy and his guards tensed, though _whom_ they would restrain was a mystery to her. 

They breathed the same thin, cold air between them for a long moment, before Sansa realized that battle was lost. He was right, after all.

_Who are you to wax poetic on love conquering all?_

"You may go."

One final jab, telling him whom and _where_ he was. Childish and unnecessary but fuck the gods, she did not care. He was not the only one who could lash out and hurt one he loved with his careless sorrow. His eyes narrowed and as if on cue, Shaggy issued a low, rolling growl of warning. Carcer and Dunn flexed their fingers. It occurred to her that if Rickon saw fit, their positions could have easily been reversed. One proclamation was all it would take. But he did not want the crown and the weight that came with it. He never had, and gods help her, she _used_ that doubt and fear to _dismiss_ him as if he were a _servant_.

Worst of all, he took it. Like her most loyal commander. Like her brother who had practically _given her_ the crown she wore.

"Your _majesty_."

He managed to make it sound like a curse and stalked away with Shaggy trotting awkwardly at his heels, Carcer and Dunn following. Sansa watched him go and then sighed. She still had much to do. Things she at least had some power over, but not the affairs that meant so much to her.

 

**THE LEARNING LADY**

 

She wasn't just packing up books and scrolls; she was seeing dear friends to proper travel. 

Her rough and rude solar was clogged with parchment and she knew she couldn't take it all, so what she did was fondest to her. Maester Marwyn's treatise "The Three Dragons", published by the grace of their owner, Queen Daenerys herself. Ebrose's "Health And Wellness". Maester Tarly's new study on magic and theories on its origin and yoking, which she'd had to scrimp and scrape to afford and kept in a hemp bag so it stayed cool and fresh at all times. 

A bundle of letters that bore no mark of great learning nor those who wore chains, but her face creased into a smile as she tucked them carefully between the rest. She would not be leaving them behind. Not him. Gods, her mind turned to that face with such ease, especially in this cobbled and cosy little place. She saw not the carved chair at her desk, but his form seated in it, broad shoulders hunched together and brow furrowed as he laboriously copied out what she had shown him. Books and leaves of parchment, some held together only with twine, and she could seem him poring over them, determined to fathom old wisdom and new ideas. The cages by the window with the roosting black things, sharp and knowing obsidian eyes, his mutterings in Skagosi as he'd fed them with breadcrumbs. 

"Learning Lady?"

Her title brought her back from the memories. Not "maester". Such a term was a strange southron eccentricity to the wildlings she had been among for years, meaning nothing to them. She was what she did, and what she did for them was impart knowledge. At first it had been a slow, painful suspicious process. They had not trusted her, like they would not any kneeler, especially one with fancy words. 

Or her scars. The grey death was writ large and hideous on her warm, sharp features, and that was the first thing they saw in Shireen. A disease. A blight. Something to be shunned and feared. It had taken her a season for them to allow her to touch them, and even longer to explain that mere contact would not pass on her curse.

"Strabo," she said, smile bright as Winter sun on her lips as she beheld the bearded man in the doorway, "We are ready, I take it?"

"Yes, Learning Lady," the man said with a curt nod instead of a bow. Ten years and still that habit was not easily taught to those from North of the Wall (or the Ruins, as they were now). "Horses and mules fed and saddled, provisions packed and loaded. Learning Lady, your escort, you should let us-"

"Prince Rickon has made safe the roads once again, Strabo," she said, cutting in as smoothly as a knife between silk sheets, just as she did when her students ranted or groused about their work or their failings or the impossibility of the squiggles mocking them on the parchment. Commanding and soothing at the same time. "We do not need to travel as if we are an army. A half-dozen men will be more than enough. The rest should stay here, with their families and their duties."

Strabo shuffled uneasily, dark eyes matching his restlessness. Ten years ago, he would have cut her throat and burned her and thought nothing of it after, satisfied that his children were safe from the grey death she carried. Now he fretted over her as if she were kin to him, caressing the sword at his belt like-

_Like Rickon._

"I'd feel safer if you took an even dozen, Learning Lady. An few extra hands never hurt on a journey. Swords, neither."

"Six mouths might. What of the rations?"

"There are enough."

Shireen cocked her head to one side, a gesture many a wildling child had learned to be wary of. It meant the Learning Lady was studying them, picking apart their words they thought so cunning or well-hidden, and finding the truth behind them. Often they didn't even have to speak first. She just seemed to work it out by herself. Strabo straightened his stance and jerked up his chin, as if challenging her.

"You have already picked the men, haven't you?"

His red beard squirmed a little under his nose as he smiled. "In a manner of speaking..."

"Ah. Volunteers."

"They do not wish harm to come to you."

Shireen felt the lump in her throat, a familiar thing in these last couple of days, when her time at Last Hearth had no longer been interminable. Word had swiftly spread that the Learning Lady had been offered a chance to study the great Words-Men and Mind-Witches of the south, at their Citadel where there were more books and scrolls and tomes than an army could read in a lifetime. They had been happy for her, but she could see the trepidation and fear for her absence behind their kind words. 

_They think because one mind leaves, the knowledge leaves with them. But knowledge passed on cannot depart, or die. They will learn that, too._

"Strabo, I... that was..."

The older man grimaced but his eyes glimmered fondly. Ten years. Such can the world change, and hearts with it. 

"Come, Learning Lady. We should reach the river before nightfall."

He turned and left her there alone in her sanctuary. It had been a crumbling hut when she'd arrived, still a child with only a handful of frozen and scorched books clasped to her chest, like another girl would a doll. Her oldest friend had been with her, helped her, protected her, and his grave was within sight of her window so she would always know he was close. But soon he would not be. She would ride away and his bones would be forgotten, the pain he had endured-

"No," she vowed to herself, fingers brushing over the little leather pouch around her neck. The one he had carried his punishment and his pride in. "Not forgotten, Onion Knight."

Again, her mind wandered, and without her fierce focus, it meandered in only one direction. But though it was her heart's decision, it clenched and gnawed at her. His face, his eyes, his manner and his form, they had grown larger with every passing year, and Shireen was too old for her years to mistake it for girish fancy. She clasped her hands together and wrung them as if for heat, though the room as warm. Wisdom, then. Comfort.

She could give sermons on histories from before Aegon's Conquest. She could educate a class in numbers and arithmetic. She spoke three languages now, and could place a dozen dialects from the North and further. She had taught herself engineering and farming, skills always thought too low for her birth, and yet essential for her station. But she had not answer for the simple question that had plagued her for years.

_How do I tell him?_

"Tell him what?" She answered softly as she saw to her bags, playing her heart against her mind as she taught her students to do when it came to rhetorical exercises. Not that she'd ever had this in mind. "There is nothing to tell. He is a Prince of Winterfell, you are a girl from a fallen house with a scarred face and no prospects."

_It would not matter._

"It _would_ ," she whispered fiercely, closing her book sack much tighter than she needed to. "The world is not so _simple_. There are other considerations, there always are."

_So you would leave the North, mayhap for years, never speaking of how you felt? How honest does that make you?_

Her lips pressed together into a proud, angry line; the strong, square jaw of her father came to the fore in the gesture, and at that thought she glimpsed herself in the polished bronze mirror in one corner. Father and mother: the face of any child was a pairing of those two progenitors. She saw her father in her jaw and her eyes; her mother in her ears and her cheeks, but mayhap there was not the pallid, gaunt paleness in her face that there had been in Queen Selyse. But covering her cheek, curving above her eye and covering one side of her neck was that black, scaled nightmare, like sun-parched black clay, cracked and immovable across her skin. 

She thought of Sandor Clegane. She looked forward to seeing him again, another who had been so cruelly marked by fate, and nevertheless endured and thrived. She worried about him, these last few years. His body was strong, though ravaged by the wars and nightmares he'd survived... but sickness ate at him, in his soul. She could see it and Shireen owed him far too much to ignore his suffering. 

Shireen stared into the mirror. Saw her father and what he had decided; her mother and her final words to her. 

"You are broken," she murmured at the reflection, loathing that her students would scarce believe their kind Learning Lady possessed flaring thick and hateful in her eyes. "Best to sharpen your mind and abandon any... anything else. You will be happier."

_Liar. Coward._

She closed her eyes and willed the words to stop, but they were joined by memory. Her scales were hard, lifeless flakes of dead skin on her face; she could no more feel through them than she could a porcelain mask on her face. But she fancied, she hoped, and she had dreamed. His fingers on them. Stroking. Exploring. Entranced, not disgusted. A nerveless, cold pressure that still thrilled her in a way utterly foreign to her mind, and her small, sharp gasp had given voice to it. But it was as naught to the warmth, the strength she felt when they slid lower, off the useless tissue and onto her throat. 

She'd looked into his eyes and saw the ember of something. The potential. But they had not the chance to find out what it was before one of his ever-present guards had smashed the frozen moment and afterwards...

"Exactly," she snarled to herself, hoisting the bag over her shoulder, "Nothing more. Not a word. Not an inclination. Use your mind, you silly girl. He doesn't want-"

Shireen paused on the edge of the doorway, face still thunderous as her father's had been, capable of cowing wildling youths who fancied themselves raiders on her best day. But she breathed deep and when she exhaled... her face relaxed. The tight mask of anger and bitterness bled away from her like poisoned blood from a wound. She did not want her last moments in this place to be of regret, of pointless, hopeless longing. 

She looked around the solar. She knew it would be maintained. Dusted. Undisturbed. Her fingers roved over the runes on the wooden doorway. Strange symbols from North of the Wall, from Skagos, and others that she'd found no knowledge of anywhere in her books. Almost like ripples and waves given form in the wood. An ancient tongue that had nothing to do with men. 

Rickon had told her of them once. He said he had dreamed them, and dreamed her knowing them.

Shireen smiled and shook her head. Not sadness. Memory. Fond and warm enough to stoke a heart to Oldtown and back again. Which is exactly where she could come one day: back to this place where she had learned so much, bloomed and flowered, and become worthy of the maesters. 

"Farewell," she whispered to the friends she could not take with her, and mayhap the errant gust sent their pages waving in glad tidings for her. "Until that day."

She closed the door and locked it, pocketing the key until she would need it again.

 

**SANDOR**

Men were one thing, but dogs were quite another, and he'd still a soft spot for the pointless little mongrels. Family habit, he supposed.

He'd heard the whining before that night, but dismissed it. Braavos was a city and like all cities, it never shut the fuck up. Laughter and cursing, hooves and wheels, the plunge and suck of oars through the canals, mules and hissing, duelling cats in the darkness... but few dogs. So Sandor had heard it clear, like a memory of his childhood and his recent years at Winterfell... but then it was gone.

He's finished his flagon and forgotten about it. Until the morning.

The high, pitiful, begging sound needled at his ear until it wormed into his mind and woke him. Dreams and visions and memories and whatever fears he had left still haunted him, but the wine soaked them, turning fires to smoldering coals instead. Everything he saw was indistinct, wet and murky. He preferred it that way, and then there was a keening that dragged his eyes open.

A dog in pain.

Sandor listened to it with his fuzzy head on the pillow, waiting for his limbs to wake up with the rest of him. His half-blind landlady puttered around outside the room but she didn't disturb him. He didn't cause trouble and paid promptly. He blocked out her hesitant shuffles and concentrated on that sound. Every minute or so, it would cry out for help. But help never came and after half an hour Sandor gave up on sleep and swung himself upright-

-getting a mallet in the side of the head for his troubles. 

"Gods... fuckin' greasy cunts an' their... their fuckin' piss-water..."

A bit bloody stronger than piss, though, the flagons he'd gotten from the shebeen down the way. He could have thrown it at the wall and stripped the dirt off it without even needing to scrub. Gods alone knew what it as doing to his guts but hells, when did that ever stop him? He drew his hands over his face, the smooth and wrinkled, the scarred and slick and cracked, until he found the hard sheen of bone at his jaw and tried not to swallow out of reflex. 

That first taste of your own mouth in the morning's was like kissing The Stranger's arsehole.

Again, the dog keened. Sandor staggered to the window and glanced outside it. Tried to pin the sound down to a direction, waiting for it again...

_There. North. Behind the blacksmith._

Again. Not just an annoyance to him now; or mayhap it was, only redirected. The bellows wheezed and hissed and there was the constant clang of strong men bending steel to their will... yet the dog continued to cry. No-one was there to help it, and no-one cared. Sandor's tip lip curled in slow, silent anger and he cursed himself for a fucking fool.

"Shit..."

He was already dressed, having collapsed into his bed without bothering to even take his boots off. Couldn't even find his fucking feet, let alone navigate the ageless conundrum of laces. So he dunked his head in the pail of tepid water by his washbowl and the world became a roaring blur in his ears and stung his eyes and he gasped when he came back up and...

_Right. Sober enough to walk straight. Big fucking improvement._

He strapped his bastard to his belt and strode out into the street, tunic, boots and breeches only. One thing he _did_ appreciate about Braavos; he didn't need to swaddle himself in layer after layer just to keep his skin from turning to ice. The later in the day, when the sun baked and boiled the canals and the steam settled over the city like a wet fucking fart, that wasn't so pleasant. But mornings like this? Dry heat. No sweat, no rivulets of it oozing down his neck and into the cracks on his face. He breathed in and deep and... gods...

_Still smells like fucking shit. Like King's Landing._

The dog cried out and an angry burst of Braavosi answered it, snapping and lashing out like a whip. Sandor turned the corner and was in a yard that reeked of burned leather and horseshit. A couple of young geldings eyed him curiously from their stalls, flat, fat teeth grinding down hay. Beyond them in the shadowy cave of the smithy's, bare-armed figures toiled and bent metal to the will of flesh. Sandor looked around, and heard the panting, gasping cry from what seemed like feet away-

They'd tied him to a tree, with a half-empty bowl of water and scraps of meat. No shelter, but food and water. Not that it helped the creature, when it had wound himself around the tree over and over and couldn't move far from it anymore, huddled under the sparse shade, panting to hard his ribs showed with every exhalation, tongue lolling out numbly. 

Sandor squinted, face stone, eyes growing colder by the moment. His ears were gone. Shorn completely off. He knew why that was.

Someone shouted at him in Braavosi. When he turned, though, the stocky smithy saw this visitor was both hideous and foreign, and wiped his hands on his apron. A taller, younger version of himself walked behind him, glaring at Sandor with the timeless challenge of youth, where his father merely scrutinized, and queried.

"What you want?"

"How much for the dog?"

The blacksmith blinked like Sandor just asked how much to plow his mother. "What you say?"

"How much... for... the dog?"

The blacksmith frowned and tried to scrub some of the grime from his face. They hadn't been working long but already the air was thick and choked with soot. Masimo and himself had a hard day ahead and he didn't need some ugly fucking Westerosi talking to him like he was a halfwit. He glanced at the mutt, trying again to get to water, straining uselessly at his leash. 

"Dog not sell. Keep."

The Westerosi nodded, as if more than one question had been answered. "Gonna make him a fighting dog, eh?" He said, fingering one ear under his long hair. "You cut off the ears. One less thing for them to lose in a fight. Stops their heads getting dragged down, too, yes?"

"No understand."

"Aye, I think you fucking do."

"You go. No sell dog."

The Westerosi didn't move. His jaw tugged from side to side under his growing beard and Tisteri knew the man would not be moved from his course. He hefted his hammer and Masimo did the same, stepping around his father. The man was big, very big, but he was outnumbered and hadn't even touched the hilt of his sword. Masimo stopped in front of him and tapped his hammer against the man's chest. 

"You go. Go now or hurt."

"Yer right about that."

Tisteri rolled his eyes. He'd already spent enough time with this nonsense. Why couldn't he just-

Then the dog whined again, and Sandor glanced at him. The leash was biting into his leg where he was caught, and the thing tried to hop and jump over its own tangled limb, but couldn't. The Braavosi muttered something dark and angry and without pause he walked over and-

-his leg came up and lifted the dog clean off its paws and sent him crashing into the tree. A yelp that was almost a child's shriek was wrenched from it as he struck and the blacksmith turned back to Sandor-

-smiling-

-like his son-

-holding his hammer-

-far too close to him.

Masimo's eyes went wide but his smile stayed. It happened that fast. The Westerosi's hand lashed out without warning, no drop of his shoulder or tensing of his muscles, and his fingers curled at the second knuckle slammed into his throat like the hammer-

-his other hand wrenched from his grip as he gasped and staggered, throat simply not working. His father shouted something out and it died with a wet, ugly gurgle, Sandor swinging the five-pound tool as if it weighed nothing, like a boy playing with a stick. He buried it in the older man's paunch and his soft belly folded around it, his guts jostled around inside his belly and he smelled shit dribble out of him as the gasping man folded down onto the shit-smeared tiles.

"Vakarulo!"

The son screamed something and Sandor didn't think what the word meant, or where he could learn it. But the beast wasn't there. Not for this. There was no red slashes in his vision, no snarling roar of bloody joy. His movements were swift but cold, clinical- Just as they'd been, thirteen years and an age ago, when he strode through King's Landing, through the guts and blood of rapists, and picked her up, took her to safety. Roaches. Snakes. Not men. Not worth the attention of the beast. The dog was screaming bedlam now, endless litany of cut-off yips and yowls echoing around the courtyard as the son spat and heaved his breath and charged, reaching out for the hammer-

-Sandor sidestepped and Masimo tried to launch a punch instead, a wild, unsteady haymaker that spoke of too much spirit and not enough training-

He swayed away from him lightly as if he were dodging a bumblebee, left hand snapping out to grab his wrist and gods he was still strong for an old man. He held the boy's arm straight and still for just a moment, just long enough for him to- -swing the hammer up into his elbow. Hard.

The boy screamed and Sandor lifted _him_ off the fucking ground, instead. See if _he_ found that so fucking amusing, with Sandor's fucking knee crushing his balls in his breeches, impact making him jump and then curl into a ball like he'd just been a ball, a mess of curled up ruined machismo and broken bones. He walked over to the dog and kicked the father on the way, barely even looking down as his toe connected with his nose.

"Fucking _cunt_."

The smithy didn't move after that. Just laid still and breathed bloody bubbles and he could have fucking choked on them for all Sandor cared. He knelt down and dwarfed the tiny creature, trembling now with its tail tucked, eyes huge and rolled upward at him. Sandor grimaced and snorted. For them he would wag his tail and hold hope; for the man that saved him, he had only fear. 

"Bloody typical..."

When the blacksmith woke up, there was a single gold coin sitting next to his had, surrounded by the puddle of blood his cracked and crunched nose had poured out. Masimo as barely moving, clutching his balls with tears and snot leaking down his face, arm at an angle most unnatural. The dog was gone. So was the Westerosi. 

"Honestly, how fucking hard is it to _not_ beat the shite out of something like _you_ , ey?"

The dog snuffled his cheek but didn't make a cogent response, of course. Not exactly a practiced conversationalist, this one. He had him tucked under his arm as he walked into the tiny stable behind the halfway house, his armor strapped to him along with the rest of his blades and all he carried into the room thrown over his other shoulder. He couldn't stay there anymore; it wouldn't take long for the two cunts to wake up and go looking, and they'd hear the dog. But he couldn't just cut him loose and let him go, either. 

Sandor looked down at the pup in his arm with something like exasperation. They were his masters. He loved them. They beat him, they starved him, they were going to make him into nothing more than a killer of his own kind, and that was all when they _weren't_ just ignoring him, even when he was in agony. But they were all he knew, and he would find his way back to them.

The big, scarred man looked down at the little, trembling dog as he heaved his bag across Stranger's back. The creature's face had already been mauled, fur puckered and red and gouged by teeth that had ripped its muzzle down to the jowl. But now at least his tail was wagging, just little swishes, side to side, still not deciding if this much bigger two-leg was friend or foe.

Sandor shook his head. They'd make him a little monster, beat all the love and softness out of him, until his tail stopped wagging and his growling anger never stopped. And no-one would stop them. Well, fuck _that_. 

"I've got one more stop before the alehouse, boy," he rasped at the pup he tucked into a saddlebag, bulbous head with its huge nostrils and slowly-blinking eyes all that poked out of it. "And before I start stewing my guts and waiting to march with those ragged cunts, we're setting you loose somewhere that doesn't stink of burning fucking metal. I know what you'll sodding do, otherwise."

The dog burbled in a way almost human, rising in pitch at the end as if in query. Sandor just shrugged, flicking the reins and driving Stranger out into the street at a slow canter.

"No fucking clue, look, just be _grateful_ I'm do this all-"

Something was leaking out the bottom of the saddle bag. The one that had his spare clothes in it. Sandor pursed his lips and patted Stranger.

"Maungy wanker that y'are, you never pissed on my fucking cottons, old man..."

Strange whinnied in immodest agreement and the three of them clopped and swayed and swung down the street.


	36. Chapter 36

**NIALL**

All things considered, it could have been much worse for him. Not that it stopped him grousing, of course.

"Damn... Fucking... Bollocks... Shit-!"

And with that final, original retort, his leg gave up the ghost and the world was turning and lurching until he reached out for the nearest solid object... which happened to be a passing washerwoman.

"Oi?! Mind where you're putting your paws, lad!"

"S-Sorry, madam," Niall said, words coming out in a stammer. The trembling, numbing throb in his leg forgotten as he pulled his hands back from a chest that could have seated three comfortably. "Just... lost my balance a little."

"A lot, I'd say," the woman said, running her eyes up and down the form of a man who'd been in bed too bloody long. His hair was a mess and his skin was pallid from days behind closed curtains, but they were the least of his concerns. Dressings criss-crossed his torso; white slashes of material peeking through the edges of his tunic. Another one snaked around his neck, evidence of an ax that nearly took his ear off and half his bloody head. One leg was a tingling mass that alternated between "mild pain" and "Seven Fucking Hells!". But then her eyes found his face and Niall felt it going uncomfortably warm at the eyebrow she quirked at him. "Not that I'd mind, if you were capable."

"I-I-I, well, madam, that-that is to-"

"Oh, please, lad," she said, squeezing by him down the corridor and helping him shove his crutch tighter under his arm. "Don't go chasin' after yer tongue on my account. Get some life back in yeh. Then come looking for Keera."

"I... um... thank you."

Niall watched her walk away, in that he watched her hips sway side to side and judging by the little look she tossed her her shoulder, she bloody well knew he was watching, too. He hazarded a smile as she turned the corner and Niall rolled back his shoulders. War hero. Battle-proven warrior. That was him, now, against all bloody expectations. He'd always noticed the girls made eyes at the lads with a few nice scars, and buggery if he hadn't earned a few of them. He caught his face in a window and upturned his lips in appraisal.

"Not bad," he murmured, wincing as he twisted his head to the side, imagining what the livid, throbbing slash on his neck would look like one day. "Makes me look a little more like a man, I'd wager-"

"I wouldn't."

The voice was so close and _oh gods it was a woman_ , that Niall nearly jumped out of his ravaged skin as he turned, which wasn't a good idea considering-

"Fuck!"

-his leg. How could he forget?"

Lady Jonelle stifled a chuckle, arms crossed across her boiled leather armor as she shook her head. Niall managed with some difficulty to right himself and not glare daggers at a bloody highborn. Maids and servants and bannermen were wandering through the castle, the chores and duties of day permitting no slack. After Keera, their little corner of it was quiet, but even so-

"Oh, don't worry, boy," Jonelle said with a roll of her eyes. "No-one saw you jump like a kitten."

Niall shuffled on unsure feet and found the courage to look her in the eye. He'd damn well held that fucking gatehouse until his clansmen's friends had surged up the stairs to reinforce them. He'd hacked and stabbed and cut and brawled and had the same treatment doled out to him, as his body attested. He went up those stairs with thirty of the stocky little Wolfswood sods. Eight had come back down with him, and three of them had to be carried. 

He didn't know any of their names. He hadn't asked. They didn't know his, either, but they'd saved his life a dozen times, in that mad hour that seemed long as a whole year. They'd died around him and next to him and with their hands holding his, slick and warm before turning cold and still. Niall saw them at night and asked them for forgiveness. That he'd dared to live and leave them behind. Now he saw them in the waking and found a cold, indignant anger freeze in his guts. 

The boy who'd been amiably driving a cart around White Harbor a score of days before was not the man who'd survived all that _shite_ just to cower before a woman, even a highborn.

Even the Lady Jonelle.

"Little unfair, I think."

"Sounded accurate to me, lad."

"Niall."

She blinked, head cocking a touch in surprise. "I beg your pardon?"

"My name is 'Niall'," he said, surging through the whisper that was screaming him for being a _fucking idiot_. "Not 'boy'."

"I know what your name is, _boy_ ," she said, only smiling at his scowl. "But I suppose it's a lady's prerogative."

"To do what?"

"Is that a tone I hear in the smuggler's voice?"

"Gods, please?!" Niall's attitude shifted like the deck of a ship in a storm, sliding from sullen to anxious and he stepped forward, eyes peering and searching the empty stone hallway. "Not so loud! You know what Stannis does to smugglers."

" _This_ smuggler got him into Winterfell, and is soon to be raised to the Northern cavalry."

"Oh, like that'll stop the humorless sod from... wait, what was that last thing you said?"

"'Milady'."

"What?!"

"'The last thing you said, _milady'_. _That's_ how you should address me."

Niall knew he shouldn't stare, especially with his mouth open. But he still did both. Lady Jonelle held his gaze with her back straight and shoulders squared, just like the woman he first met in Castle Cerwyn. A pillar of Northern granite opening her gates to them, ushering cold and meagre knights to shelter. A thick dressing had mummified one of her hands down to the wrist, and Niall could tell by the shape of it that she'd lost fingers. Not that it seemed to bother her much, standing there with an eyebrow arched and her eyes twinkling, giving him sodding etiquette lessons. 

He rolled his tongue around the inside of his lips and took a slow breath. Fine. She wanted to jape. Probably as bored as he was, and fuck knew how _that_ came about. Weren't highborns meant to have duties, too? 

"What was the last thing you said, milady?"

"Much better. See, not so hard was it?"

"Niall."

"Pard-" Now it was her turn to stop on this strange little verbal carousel they seem to have found themselves on. Jonelle's lips twisted in amusement and she shrugged, as if giving way to his vanity was no skin off her nose. "In recognition of your courage and your aid, Stannis and the Northern lords want to make you part of the Northern cavalry, trained right here, in Winterfell. _Niall_."

The carter's little flush of victory was quickly dwarfed by reality banging on his door like Revenue agents, wanting some quick questions about the contents of his wagon. The Northern cavalry? He'd seen plenty of them throughout his short life, but they were like... knights, weren't they? Everything except the "ser" part, anyway, because precious few Northmen bothered with the Seven. But they trained all the time and ate well and fought for their lords on horses and maidens in the North thought them quite dashing and...

"I don't even have a horse."

"I'm sure you'll be provided with one."

"But-!" There was more, he was sure of it, but Niall's mind was still stammering over it. "I... I drive a cart! I'd never even _seen_ a battle until that scrap with the Frey's!"

"But you were on the winning side of one seven days ago." Jonelle looked him up and down, lingering a little longer than was necessary to take stock of his injuries. Niall felt that damn flush returning before shaking some sense into himself. _Hello?! Highborn?!_ "And not without injury, I might add. Without your smuggler ways, Stannis and Lady Sansa would never have had their victory."

"Sandor, too."

She smiled, and it was a pretty thing. That was the word Niall thought of right away, though he'd never heard it spoken of with her name or face before. In Jonelle's face there wasn't the radiant, sculpted beauty of Lady Sansa, with shapely cheeks and eyes and lips, following down to a lithe, tight body that men would moan into their pillows over. More like a handmaiden than anything else. Thin food and hard riding had cut away some of the bulk to her, but when Niall saw men glance at her, it was usually lords with their eyes on her house, not her figure.

He doubted many had seen her smile and mean it.

_They don't know what they're missing._

"S... Sorry, what was that, milady?"

"I said, rather telling how you added Sandor's name to that so quickly. Rather fond of the big brute, are we?"

Niall must have been, because the flush that pulsed through him then was more of annoyance than embarrassment. Yes, Sandor was a seven-foot arsehole who growled at everyone and looked like a pit-dog's arse, but he was brave and loyal to his Lady and without him, Niall would be a dead man. So he didn't like Jonelle's tone and he bloody well didn't mind his words when he snapped out-

"Telling like how you left the 'King' off Stannis but were sure to say 'Lady Sansa'?" Her eyes darkened and her smile flickered, but Niall just gave a tight one of his own. " _That_ kind of telling?"

He expected a rejoinder; was almost looking forward to it, actually, and couldn't fathom why. He'd known lords flog men for "impudence" before, a great and cruel catch-all term for anything, ranging from assaulting one of noble blood to so much as sneering at a highborn. She could easily have done that, for she always had those-

 _No_ , he thought, noticing for the first time the three sworn-shield-shaped holes in the air around Jonelle. _Not without her guards, though I wouldn't like to try my luck against her now. But why aren't they at her heels anyway?_

Her expression was the rest of the question to his mind, and thus provided the means to the answer. Her eyes flickered down the hallway like his did a moment before, and though it was still bare save the echoing sounds of the kitchen down at the far end of the First Keep, she stepped closer, as if eager ears were set into the walls. But it was Niall that spoke first, voice a studious murmur.

"You didn't just _happen_ to be wandering the halls, did you, milady?"

Lady Jonelle shook her head and Niall groaned internally. And to think he'd been naive enough to think he'd left highborn schemes behind in White Harbor...

"No, Niall. I did not."

"You were looking for me."

She didn't even bother to demand he tack on her title. Another tell, going with the growing seriousness in her brown eyes. "Yes, I was."

"Because of Sandor."

She nodded. Well, that was expected. The only things Niall seemed to get involved in nowadays were due to Sandor; problem was, those things usually came with the risk of painful, heated death. But even as his face hardened to this new intrigue, Niall felt a surly little sniff of annoyance that she hadn't just wanted to see him. Which was fucking demented, naturally, since why would she? He may have been a hero now, or the baseborn mummery of one, but in a season his name would fade, and hers would last until she died. What he _wasn't_ expecting, however, was-

"But not _just_ him."

She talked, low and urgent. Niall listened, and at the end of it, he rubbed a weary hand over an equally exhausted face.

"Will you do as I ask?"

"I'll do what I can, milady, but I won't promise for another man. I'll talk, he'll listen, then it's up to him. Will you do the same for her?"

"I will try."

He bowed lowly and started to turn, crutch raised over the stone and-

-her hand touched his shoulder. Didn't grip it, just rested there, but she might as well have impaled him through the stone and into the sodding ground. Niall blinked and looked over her bare hand into her brown eyes. They weren't so bad, either.

_Just a little wide apart, mayhap._

"Thank you, Niall."

He bowed again, and hazarded a smile that Keera would probably have liked.

"My pleasure, milady."

 

**SANDOR**

"Gods, man, close your fuckin' hole or I'll ram my fist down it!"

"I have a responsibility to my patient, ser!"

"To get on his fuckin' nerves every waking sodding hour?"

"To ensure that he is not overexerting or overstretching his-"

"Stranger's soggy _sack_ , do I _look_ like a maid who's just fuckin' _whelped?!_ "

The maester was starting to get right up his bloody hooter. With each passing day, each waking morning and every visit from Sansa, Sandor felt his strength return to him, like spring rains bringing life and swell back to a riverbed. He went from soup and gruel to bread and cheese and meat within a day; by the second he was walking around, shuffling, hesitant, but moving. By the third he could lift his sword when he was certain the old man wasn't around to scold him, and that afternoon, he could almost swing the damn thing.

But that didn't please the maester. Oh, no, not even a little. 

"Clegane," the man said, using the tone he probably reserved for naughty children, which just made Sandor's nostrils flare wider. "A handful of days ago you were near death. You have healed quickly, as I expected from a man of your vigor, but-"

"Well, fucking thank you-"

"- _but_ , you still need to give your wounds time to heal and your muscles time to fully recover. Jerking a heavy piece of metal around the room is _not_ aiding that process."

Sandor snorted and tossed the bastard sword from one hand to the other, flicking the hilt as he did to send it spinning through the air, satisfyingly close to the maester. The old man shrunk back a step and glowered, and Sandor caught it easily-

_Fuck me that hurt._

-and covered his wince with a smile, holding the sword up straight and sneering around one side of it. 

"I've been swinging steel so long that this is barely a feather to me, old man, and my stitches are as firm as they were this morning. I'm Lady Stark's sworn shield," he said, and his words came out in leaden, stonecast tones as he did, "And I'll be buggered and blasted if I don't keep my talents honed for when I return to her service."

"Clegane, I cannot-"

"Oh, I wouldn't bloody bother, maester." Both of them turned to the new voice in the doorway. "You've a better chance of separating a maiden from her doll."

Sandor snorted but there was a smile curling on his good side when he saw the speaker; maester Varun just pursed his lips and threw his best withering gaze at the equally-battered but just as full-of-himself young man who stood there. Wry smile tugging at his lips, crutch under one arm. Sandor felt the smile widen even more when Niall's brows shot upward and he gave a short, sharp bark of laughter.

"Oh, is that look meant to throw a bloody _scare_ into me? You didn't know my _mother_ , maester. She could make you piss wine and shit wildfyre with a _glance_."

The maester looked fit to blow some tubing but Niall just threw up a hand, using his other one to limp into the room. Sandor could see that nasty cut on his leg wasn't paining him as much as it was. It would heal, and better than his own. Oh, he was still a bloody daemon with steel in his hands, or without it, but that twinge and groan in his right leg would never go away. Polliver. Bloody ordinary-looking cunt, with his featureless face, bland as milk. Yet he'd been the one to put a dirk through his thigh and add twenty years to his life.

"I've come on business from Lady Stark and her lords, maester," Niall said, pulling himself straight when he did, eyes cool and unconcerned. "And for that, I will require the room, and you to toddle off down the hall." 

The maester frowned and glanced at Sandor. _Too shrewd_ , Sandor thought. _Bastard watches everything too bloody closely, and not just the things that need healing._

"Boy, I am in service to this castle, and I-"

"First of all," Niall said, voice not quite matching his smile anymore, stepping closer. "I'm not yer boy. Second, I dunno much about maesters, but from what I've heard, you serve your _lord_. And _your_ lord is King Stannis, _not_ Lady Stark. You just happen to be in her castle, healing her men, eating her food, because your King tells you to."

"And that makes you think I can't be trusted?"

"Don't mean anything to me, mate. I know what I'm told, and they told me to make sure it was a _private_ conversation. That means, you aren't in the room, or the hall outside. Don't like that? Take yer complaint to the Lady of Winterfell."

Which, Sandor knew, Varun wouldn't dare do. His king? Maybe, but by the time he'd done that, whatever Niall had to say would have kissed the breeze and then vanished into his head. But the smile had fell from his face. Niall was hiding something behind his light smile and confident eyes. His nostrils twitched like he could smell the lie, and Varun huffed indignantly on his way out.

"Most disrespectful, young man. I recall dressing your wounds, as well, if you remember-"

"Aye," Niall said, "Aye, y'did-"

His arm snapped out. His palm smacked into the doorframe and barred the shuffling maester from his exit, and when the stunned old man looked at his side, Niall's eyes did not have any humor in them. Sandor blinked. Well, _this_ was a welcome change...

"And because of that, I'll tell ya that it's something about Lord Wylis, who died taking this place. Something from Lord Wyman, and he couldn't make it. Lady Sansa is..." Niall's eyes roved around, as if uncomfortable, searching for words. Sandor watched him. He knew the look; he'd seen it before, spinning lies under an open face to a pair of watchmen. "... upset, about the manner of his death. His father is worse. You saved my arms and legs from rotting off, maester, and I don't forget that. But any more than that? No... No, I don't think so. Now go off and make sure you check some poor sod at the _very end_ of his hallway, will you?"

_He's lying. That's not why he's here._

Sandor knew the truth of the lie without even being told. He could tell a lie before it was even spoken, most times. The way the eyes roved and dipped and raised; breathing and fidgeting hands. Shuffling and grasping and even those men who thought stillness would cover their deception. Niall liked adding little flourishes, like an artist giving more color to his palate, but Sandor could see still it. 

Fortunately, he didn't see Varun do the same.

"I... Well... I will be back later, Clegane."

"Wonderful."

Niall removed his arm and watched him go, then looked to Sandor... and grinned. Sandor snorted and sat down on the bed, very carefully.

"You... lying little... sod..."

The boy smirked and shrugged, and gods, Sandor wondered when he would stop thinking of him as that. He'd fought, he'd killed, he'd survived and shown both courage and cunning. When would he earn the title of one with hair on his balls? He closed the door behind him and dragged a stool over to where Sandor sat, sitting opposite him...

Hunched forward. Elbows on his knees. Shoulders down. Pensive. Anxious.

"Gotta keep in practice, Clegane," he said, and the smile was a touch forced. His eyes were too busy. Choosing words. "Never know when I might have to go back to carting around with grog and smoke in my wagon."

"You really think that'll happen? After what you did here? Don't be stupid."

Niall smiled and his eyes swam out of focus. When he spoke again, it was as if he were describing a dream, or a vision. "Lady Jonelle, she said I was to be... raised into the Northern cavalry. Y'know what they are?"

"Like knights, but for you Northern sods. No 'ser' or night freezing in a sodding sept. No sword hovering around your bloody neck or pious, stupid vows."

"You really _don't_ like the gods, do you?"

"I like 'em as much as they deserve. Look around the world and tell me how much that is."

Niall didn't even try to argue with that. He settled back and saw a plate of food, eager fingers picking through the scraps to find some morsels that Sandor had allowed escape. The big man sat further back and tried to force down the pain in his leg. Seven days. Soon to be eight. Away from her side, her thoughts, her protection and her touch. He'd gone from being wrapped in her every night and day to being teased by her visits. The days either rushed by or dragged like syrup through snow. Then she visited him and that single hour, of half-hour, was weeks, seasons... and then gone. 

He wanted to get moving again. Get on his feet, back in the training courtyard, have the weight and reassurance of armor and gauntlets and blades both weighing him down and making him whole. The pain was stopping all that. Making him weak and slow and the more he endured it, the more his gorge rose and he was sure, _sure_ that eventually someone would take advantage of his absence. 

_She needs me. So much I haven't told her and have to..._

"Well, fair enough, I suppose."

"So what's this about the fat lord? Heard he copped it."

"Aye, on the bridge, when Stannis rode in. Got a quarrel in him, like his brother at the Twins, I heard" Niall said. He shrugged and there was some shred of sadness there from the White Harbor lad. "Shame, really. Not a bad lot, the Manderlys, and Lord Wyman's already lost one son."

Sandor felt his lips sneer, gods, so easily. Any grief, any fine words directed at noble names, and he felt the scorn of decades rising to meet them before he was even aware of it. But he was not that man anymore; The Hound that cared for naught but killing and hating highborns. That fat bloody fool, he'd almost got himself killed the first night they met, but by the time they left that white, salty city, he'd rallied his knights under the Stark colors, then helped her do the same with House Cerwyn. He'd fought well against the Freys; he'd spoke on Sansa's side in the Crofter's Village. Sandor knew he'd died well, if one even could do that.

_Not well. Usefully. No such thing as dying well..._

"Aye," he said, head bowed a touch as he nodded. "Would have liked to see him waddling around again..."

"I'm not here about that. Not really."

"Aye, figured that much. So what brings yeh t'see my ugly arse?"

"You and Lady Sansa, Clegane."

Sandor watched him very closely. Lips tight and white. Hands curling and uncurling at his sides. The boy seemed to be expecting a blow, but made no move to get out of the way. He'd said his piece, as simply as he could, and now Sandor had a hundred lies and threats rampaging through his kill.

_Don't know what yer talking about._

_Mind your fucking mouth._

_Fuck you think you are?_

_Are you fucking mad?!_

_I am her sworn shield and nothing more._

"Not buggering around, are you?"

Niall managed a shaky smile, nibbling at a rib bone Sandor had tossed back on the plate. "Ain't got the bloody time to dance around it."

Sandor knew what he meant, glancing at the doorway even at the hint of that fucking lurking grey bastard. He could imagine him now, creeping down the hall, ear pressed to the door, ready to run back to his one-armed chief and spill his guts. Sandor snarled at the thought. Oh, _he'd_ spill his guts for him: straight out his fucking navel. 

"I think he knows to let it alone for a while."

"That's not what I was talking about."

"Then what is?"

Niall was taking a deep breath before each reply now, even though his words were coming out as low, careful murmurs. They sunk into conspiracy in that cramped, crowded little room, and Sandor didn't like it. Anything that required such care and secrecy, with Sansa tangled in it... that always spoke of badness to him. Hidden enemies and shadow daggers, the kind a blunt bloody fool like him couldn't stop. 

"People are starting to talk."

Sandor's pride and anger spoke for him before his mind did, flashes of fat, leering lords jabbering about his Sansa spreading her legs making him grind his teeth as he did. "Who? Tell me their names."

"The names don't matter," Niall said, waving away the question with a sharp look that said he still understood it. And mayhap wished he didn't. "The problem is that they _are_. People aren't _stupid_ , Sandor. Highborns aren't _blind_ , either, and neither are servants or maids or soldiers. From White Harbor to here, you've been inseparable, always by her side. Sleeping in her chamber, in her tent..."

The words trailed off, letting Sandor paint the rest of the picture, and the big scarred man can't help but feel the carter's boy has some talent for fucking highborn games. His words were cautious but flowed well, and he didn't think the tone of concern was faked. Although it befuddled the living bollocks out of him.

"I am her sworn shield," he said, voicing the lie but for a different reason. "Why would anyone think me staying close means I'm..."

Gods, was it really so hard? The whores he'd fucked had been nothing, just sacks of wet flesh for him to make wetter with his own seed. He'd taken his first whore when he was thirteen and had only felt a bite of hunger afterwards, not shame or confusion or, gods forbid, a sense of devotion to one who sold her cunt for coppers. But he couldn't reconcile those meaningless actions with Sansa. They hadn't even done that, for fuck's sake, and still his tongue tripped over the words.

"It's not that _simple_ , Sandor. People see how you look at each other." Niall leaned closer, flicking a look over his shoulder at the door again. "You think I'm the only one who saw how you two look at each other? The way she smiles at you? The way you _only_ smile at her?" The boy swallowed and scratched under his chin. Gods, he could barely even grow a beard. "People talk, Sandor. Servants, maids, lords-"

"Aye, you fucking said-"

"Well you need to listen," Niall said, and Sandor nearly growled at his interruption. "Because Lady Jonelle tells me some of the Northern lords aren't bloody happy."

"Oh, fuck them and fuck her-" 

Niall's jaw tightened until Sandor heard teeth scrape and screech in his mouth. He studied that face, growing paler in anger, and realized... oh, fuck... oh, gods, boy.

_Not you, too?_

" _Don't_ talk about her like that," Niall said, struggling to compose himself, even wounded and opposite, well, Sandor Sodding Clegane. "She's talking with Sansa right now-"

"What?!"

"Just like I am with you and="

"What's she saying?!"

"The same thing I will, I suppose-"

"Oh, fuckin' _hells_ , boy?!"

Gods, he wanted to crawl into bed and sleep and never wake up. He wanted to open his veins and drift away, or just put his sword through his own head, like the little wolfbitch always said she'd do one day. He wanted to do... something. He didn't even know what. He lowered his head between his knees and clutched it and his heart roared in his ears and every pump around his body seemed to set his stitches to sizzling.

_Now she'll hear about how all snigger behind her back. Carrying on with a hideous, vicious, brutish beast like you. You know how rumors work: they won't just end with fucking kissing and hugging. They'll say you plowed her like a Flea Bottom cunt and she moaned for it. That you ruined her._

_You have ruined her. I ruined her._

_Gods._

"Sandor," Niall said, voice like the hand he didn't dare reach out to rest on his shoulder. "That's why I'm here. Why she sent me, and why she's talking to Lady Stark now. So we can do something about this, help you both."

"Oh, aye?" Sandor said, bringing up his face, hair flowing over it and his scars and his eyes threatened to burn the stringy black strands away from his gaze. "How the _fuck_ can this be helped?"

Niall stared at him. Sadness in his eyes. The obvious answer, the one Sandor knew damn well and had known since that kiss in White Harbor, but hadn't looked at. The boy with his bruises and his dressings and all this shit Sandor didn't want on his shoulders sighed. Scratched the back of his neck, so embarrassed it was making bloody Sandor feel uncomfortable. 

"You know how."

 _Aye_ , Sandor thought. _I do_.

There was silence between them for as long as there'd been when Niall first spoke of his true purpose. Candles sputtered occasionally, too quickly and lowly, as if ashamed to be breaking the mood. The wounded men down the hall had no such scruples, and both of the men kept their ears cocked for the scraping of leather sandals on stone as Maester Varun made his rounds. There didn't seem much left to say between them. No words necessary when the action was clear. 

Sandor swallowed hard. _You blind, bloody fool..._

"Will you talk to her?"

He nodded dumbly. He barely felt the sting and ache and groaning in his bones anymore. Everything seemed to have numbed from his heart outwards; even the command to nod his head seemed to have been delegated. 

"Aye. When I can speak to her alone. Not here, with that... cunt outside sniffing the fucking door crack."

Niall nodded, more than he needed to, happy that his role had been accomplished... but the relief did not stay. Sandor didn't know how he looked, but it was enough for the boy's sharp eyes to blunt and soften and he shook his head. 

"I'm sorry, Sandor. She knew me and you, well... we don't hate each other," he said, giving Sandor a smile that was brilliant and true and he could barely even snort at it. Nothing stirred in his heart. Nothing but cold, cloying bitterness. "So she knew it might come better from me than from her."

"Smart girl, your lady."

Niall frowned and cocked his head, confusion fresh and clear and honest on his features. In the worst way, the saddest way, that birthed a smile on Sandor's face. Poor boy didn't even realize he was doomed. Still just thought it was a boyish fancy or a passing whim. He'd yet to reach those nights when she intruded in his dreams and he longed for sleep all the next day. Those days where he would be hungry, starving, _addled_ for the merest sight of her. When a slight smile in his direction would have given him strength to wrestle a kraken. 

_Only the boy won't have all that shit sloshing around in his head that you do. Poor fuckin' brat._

"Not _my_ lady, Sandor. I'm a Manderly man."

_Yeah, of course you are._

"Aye, so you are."

Niall gave him that same odd look again but seemed to brush it away. He'd done enough, and now just wanted to leave. Sandor waited under he was up and limping to the door before speaking one last time. 

"Niall?" The boy turned, eyes wide that he'd actually had someone use his name without him _asking_ first. "Learn from this."

"From what?"

"This. What I'm up to my bloody neck in."

He expected the boy with his hand around the door handle to scoff or snort or do something equally contemptuous. Fall for a _highborn_? Gods, most smallfolk prayed their children weren't so _stupid_. You may as well devote yourself to a carving of a forest sprite and see as much warmth and satisfaction come from it. Sandor was sure Niall's own parents had banged it into his head that you _did not_ bugger around with lords, lordlings and maidens. 

They were never the ones hurt by it. Always the smallfolk, the lowborns; they reaped all the punishment and pain. 

But Niall just nodded carefully. Smart lad. He'd go far. Unless his own heart chained him and dragged him down. 

"You going to see her later?"

He shook his head. "No, she already visited me earlier."

 _Thank fuck_ , he silently added. What a bloody nightmare that would have been: smiling and chuckling with her face bright and warm and so close to him, and all the while thinking "I have to find a nice way of telling you I can't ever touch you again". He let his spine go limp and fall back onto the bed, staring at the ceiling. 

"Y'won't tell her until tomorrow?"

Sandor could have laughed. _Yes, dodged the arrow for one day, dog. But fear not: it'll skewer you tomorrow._

"Until I'm back at her door. Privacy, ain't that what you said? None of that shite here."

"True enough," the sound of the door clicking open and Niall's voice changed like a face with a mask pulled over it, for the prowling Varun's benefit, not his own. "... I'll be sure to tell him such, Clegane. Fair night to you."

"Aye, and you too, Niall."

The door closed behind him and by increments, Sandor jerked and jimmied himself back into the bed. Moments later Varun returned and Sandor didn't have the strength to growl at the man. He took his observations and proddings and ointment and the changings to his dressings without a word. The man's bird eyes were on him the whole time and Sandor wondered if he was one of _them_. One of the whisperers. Japers. Mockers who chuckled as that beautiful, kind girl walked past, muttering of her how The Hound had broke her cunt for the North-

"Clegane?!"

Sandor blinked and found his hand around the man's wrist, thin as a branch wrapped in diseased bark, eyes trembling and face pale. The man had been applying some fresh salve or another and Sandor had just... moved.

"I... sorry," he managed to say, clutching at the side of his head and trying to play it up. "Thought I was somewhere else for a moment..."

"Has this happened before?"

"Not this late," Sandor said, shrugging his shoulders and settling into the groves and bumps his body had pressed into the mattress. "Night's sleep would do me proper, I think. Might've overdone it today."

Oh, wasn't that just the treat the grey fucking dog had wanted? There was a victorious glint in his eyes as he nodded, rendering the concerned curl of his lips as naught but a counterfeit. "Mayhap tomorrow you should stay in bed, hmm? Avoid that pork, too? Meat does madden the mind, they say."

"Sounds like an idea," Sandor said, but he could only give a smile with his teeth when he tried. "G'night, maester."

"Clegane..."

The door closed and Sandor sat in the room that was still filled with dancing shadows from the lit candles. Varun didn't want to have to bumble around lighting them if he had to barge in to aid his patient one night, so some were always flaring. He stared at them, one by one. He thought back to the hut in the Neck. The soft, chaste thing she'd given him that had cut him so deep. White Harbor. A night he'd seen her willing to tear down her own mind and never build it back up, and he stopped her with his stupid, desperate lips. The godswood the next day. Castle Cerwyn.

 _You said you would try_ , Sandor thought, watching a candle sputter and gut and the light died. Darkness rushed in to devour the void it left. _And you did. You both did. But where was this going, Sandor? What end did it have?_

How can this be helped? Those had been his words. He found another candle; chasing the light and the hope they were until that stub of wax with a ragged cord in it vanished, too. No matter how tall or full, they all burned down eventually.

Those freezing tents during the march. Their hut in the Crofter's Village. The sight of her. The sounds she'd made that echoed in his mind as if she were there, by his side, just like her touch still tingled on his rough skin. Sandor breathed deep and there was but one candle left. He watched until it's flame stopped waving at him and the darkness claimed it and held dominion over all, from the door to the floor to the ceiling, all save the dirty window in one corner.

How could this be helped?

The Moon lay beyond it. Fat and silver like a coin flipped into the sky and frozen there before a decision had been made by its descent. Pitted and marked as if bombarded by trebuchets. Sandor stared at the last light, and in its paleness saw her face, bursting with relief that he was alive. Begging him to live when he had gone to die. Her words to him that he did not doubt anymore, and his to her. Now they all had die, laid as false as the maester's cheap, hollow smiles.

How could this be helped?

"It can end."

Sandow whispered the words to the round face that gave him no reply, then turned his own away, and tried in vain to sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have an awful feeling that unless I make some... shall we say, romantic backpedals, some of my readers here that will remain unnamed will give serious thought to tracking me down.
> 
> There is a point to this! I swear!


	37. Chapter 37

**LADY JONELLE**

She found her in the godswood, singing to the trees. 

Jonelle feels the weight of her grim task lighten for a moment, and she can't help the smile and brief snort of laughter. She remembered Sansa before all this; a pretty, smiling, proper girl who loved her stories. She wasn't like her sister, a mess of mud-ruined dresses and bruised knuckles and childish defiance. She'd never vanished into the forest looking for fae and sprites and snarks... but she never had to. Even at the feast where Jonelle met her, she had a book of legends and tales tucked under the table.

Sansa was already in love with a different world, Jonelle realized, long before she was taken from the North and thrown to the lions. Unfortunately, the fantasy did not aid her, and her dreams twisted into golden-haired nightmares. 

Yet she still heard it. Wandering into the sprawling godswood, vast compared to all others, Jonelle had barely gone a dozen paces before she heard it, and knew her ears would do the job of her eyes that day. 

 

_Swear not, my knight,_

_Ride far, and ride fast,_

_Tie not your love,_

_To one doomed to pass._

 

It was both full and breathless, like a Western wind fresh from the ocean. Jonelle breathed deep as she saw her childhood in those words: all the tales and histories that weren't really "history", but learned as such regardless. The words flowed and lilted and sped and slowed and danced, played with her ears and gods, was that a flush of desire she felt run through her spine to her feet? The urge to twirl and dance without weight or care?

She walked to where the noise was coming from, echoing and sliding around black, tough ironwood trees and sentinels cloaked in needles, already leaking their sweet sap into the air. With each brush across the stiff, fallen leaves and the frozen ground beneath her, she found herself closer.

 

_O 'twas cruel you did come here,_

_O 'twas cruel you did see,_

_Swear not, my knight,_

_This I vow, this I swear,_

_Thou shalt wait no more._

 

The girl was warm in grey and white, and one could easily mistake it for the same dress she'd worn the day she returned to her home. But the girl had found her Northern dresses - thick cotton and wool with fur trims so high and deep you could use them as pillows - still in her neglected chambers and barely been out of them since she'd returned. Whether it was holding court in the Great Hall or seeing to other duties around the castle or simply walking and visiting as she did now, Sansa swaddled herself in Northern colors. It made Jonelle smile, seeing her as such, even as she noticed the girl gently fingering the scrap of cloth in her hands.

And she noticed the way she stuffed it back up her sleeve when Jonelle called out, as well.

"Rather a melancholy choice, Lady Stark," she said, walking over to the towering weirwood Sansa was sitting under, long face etched on it unmistakably Stark, though the bloody leaves that fell all around them were undoubtedly Sansa. "For a conquering princess."

The Lady of The North laughed lowly and shook her head, dipping her chin and sending a fresh wave of grounded, fiery beauty shaking around her. Jonelle felt a familiar tug of envy at the sight of her, and brutally quashed it as she would a bloody sparring partner. Or Bolton, if she'd another chance with the whoreson wretch. She was a woman of two-and-thirty, and she was done with jealousy. The gods had given her the form they had, and she would not question their motives further. 

 _Not when they allow and ignore far worse_ , she thought sourly.

"Not me, I think, Jonelle. I didn't fight. I didn't die. The soldiers did."

"Ah, true," Jonelle said, brushing out her skirts to she could sit easier. Her tone was that of a septa or a maester, mayhap, ready to give instruction, and it surprised her. "But they would not have come without you."

"Stannis would have brought them."

"But Stannis would not have had Niall to smuggle men into Winterfell and overthrow the gates. He would have starved, like Bolton said, or lost his army in taking the castle, and most likely destroyed it in the doing." Jonelle smiled and hoped Sansa could not see the pain her eyes held. For the farce she had to play and the truths she did not wish to speak. "It was the Lady of Winterfell that made that happen."

"No," Sansa said, voice soft and her hand glided to stroke the outside of her sleeve. _That_ sleeve. "Sandor Clegane made that happen."

And right there, Jonelle saw the way open to her. Sansa smiled at her without gates or walls or armor, and the trust the girl had in her made her want to cringe. Mayhap no-one else in Winterfell, in the _North_ , could have her confidence in such a matter, save Niall. She didn't need to finagle an entry or steer the conversation; Sansa had handed it to her within moments of her sitting down. 

Jonelle swallowed and looked away. Sansa would notice. She wasn't stupid, not anymore. She noticed everything, and while she was hardly The Spider, she could deduce much. How, then, had her keen mind failed her so utterly with this... dalliance? 

 _It wasn't her mind_ , she reminded herself as she cleared her throat and drew some order across her words. _It was the other thing, and it respects no logic._  

She thought of Niall, for just a moment, but a moment was enough. For her to take some strength for his presumption and his scowl, still so boyish despite his scruff and wounds and glower. His eyes, though... they were no longer a boy's. They'd been Spring chestnuts before, when she'd first met him, but now they were blackened, hardened and inured to what he'd done and seen. Gods, she'd seen so many boys go through that change. When they discovered that war was not the fine, clean thing the stories and mummers crowed about. But for it to happen to Niall, it was-

_Since when did you spend so much time studying the feelings of a carter?_

"Lay... Lady Jonelle? You don't agree?" 

Jonelle breathed and in and _oh buggery_ , she'd gotten lost in herself. She cast the boy away and remembered why she was there. Her task. Her duty. She remembered her family's words: _Honed And Ready_. For _any_ task required of them, no matter how cruel... and this would be. She had no doubt of that.

"I know he's not-"

"You cannot continue your affair with him, Sansa."

Blunt force. Jonelle had no other plan save that: the truth, as it was, as it was _obvious_ , spoken plainly. Sansa's concerned expression froze. Fear clutched at her eyes for just a moment, as if she was being order by a parent or a septa. Disbelief followed it just as fast, and Jonelle caught the sting that would stay with her for a long time. Finally she spoke, voice high with dismissal and scorn. 

"I... I'm not... Jonelle, there is no _affair_ -"

"There is _something_ ," Jonelle said, words lowly but hard as the ax she'd carried days before. "And it needs to end, Sansa. People are talking, gossiping as they are always want to do. But these whispers carry as much bite as steel, if they are allowed to continue."

Indignation. She knew that would be fast-arriving. Sansa had grown into _Lady Stark_ with a speed that Jonelle admired, even been proud of, but now, on that day, she almost feared it. Sansa knew she had power now; the seat of the North was hers again, and Winterfell was garrisoned by loyal bannermen. The Umbers, the mountain clans, Manderly and Mormont and a dozen others, they had all sworn themselves to her with a fervor their vows to the Boltons had never even hinted at. The North was always for the Starks, and would always be. But even that loyalty had limits.

"Lady Jonelle," said Sansa, and Jonelle could have winced at the cold, commanding tone. So strange, and so sad, that such will could march a woman off a cliff as well as see her reclaim her birthright. "I do not... I will not give credence to rumors and scandal. Sandor is my sworn shield, and has been beside me since I fled the Vale. If there are those that think such closeness implies-"

"Gods, Sansa, don't talk to me like I'm..." Jonelle cast about her hand in irritation, fighting through the voice drummed into her since she was a girl that trembled with indignation she would talk in such a fashion to her sworn lady. "... one of _them_. Those fools that listen only to gossip and do not _see_ , have not _seen_." She looked Sansa in the eye. "I know you care deeply for him, and I am not such a maid or fool not to think those feelings are either unrequited nor..."

This was the hardest part. Not the implied ultimatum she would have to give, nor the revelation that Sansa was so discussed. But that final push, that... accusation, was all it sounded like. Because of the understanding that would come after it.

"... unconsummated by..." _The flesh? The hands? More?_ "... either of you."

_And if I can see it, others can._

Sansa's chest was heaving under her dress and not from guilt. Her eyes were so turbid with outrage and anger that Jonelle could scarce look at them. A thousand images of her being mocked and ridiculed were surely dashing before her eyes, taunting her and what she bore for the big southron that, yes, had been the key to Winterfell. But the highborns would not care for that; they cared only that their Lady, the mistress of the house they'd pledged to, was humiliating them all with a _Lannister dog_ , and that was all he would be to them. 

"Do... Do not speak so to me-"

"Sansa," Jonelle said, reaching out a hand to rest on the girl's knee, "Do not think I enjoy telling you this, I beg you. I do so because it needs to be done, because you-"

"Because what?!" Now came the fury she'd been expecting, blasting out from the girl as icy as a Wall-born wind but stoked with fire from her eyes. "Because I am to be a _good, proper lady_ and _sell myself_ to some _useful_ lordling? Is that what is _expected_ of me?!"

"Yes!"

"How... How can _you_ say that to me? Of _all_ people-"

"Because I _must_ , girl!"

Words failed the Lady of Winterfell. She shook her head over and over as if doing so would dispel all the words that had been spoken, banish the gossip and filthy tales told, covered in her name. Her knee jerked and shook Jonelle's hand off it. Leaving her alone, two feet and a hundred leagues from her.

"I thought we were _friends_ ," she said, voice low and hurt. "I thought you would _understand_."

"I do," said Jonelle, and found her own voice wet with tears, though it was hardly her heart being cut out and broken. "Oh, Sansa, I do. I know what it is like to be... seen as chattel. To know your future will be decided for you, that your heart cannot be your own to give-"

"But now it can be!" Sansa's eyes shone with something that made Jonelle's guts writhe. Not quite madness, but given time and pain, it could easily turn that way. "I don't need to marry myself off! My parents are _dead_!" Jonelle's jaw dropped at her tone. Gods, it almost sounded _triumphant_. "My brothers are gone! I don't need to listen to them anymore! I don't need to listen to anyone!"

Jonelle sat there and stared, horror writ all over her face. Sansa's own face was flushed and seemed to shift and twist between pain and anger and unfettered certainty. She slowly shook her head and looked up into the disapproving wooden face. Silently begged them for the words that would turn this girl from ruin.

"Sansa... let me tell you what will happen."

"I do not need lessons in-"

"You will continue your affair with Sandor. You will grow closer, and one day it will become obvious to all. Then you will marry him, as you wish." She drew herself up and forced herself to drop the ax as she should. "And your union will not help the North. It will isolate it. Lords from here to Dorne will scorn the name Stark as foolish and backward. There will be no chance of an alliance with the southron houses, who still have the armies that we will need when the Others come pouring down from the North."

"You know none of this, it's all just-"

"Stannis will abandon you," Jonelle said, plowing on ruthlessly, as if she were battering down a wall. "The North will be untenable to him, because it will only have the ragged remnants in this castle on this day. And that is _if_ he allows you to marry Clegane, which he likely would _not_ -"

Sansa showed her teeth, now. The direwolf in her was buried deep under the rivers and radiance of her Tully blood, but that only mean when it did emerge, it was all the fiercer. "If he _tried_ , I would-"

"Forget your word to him? Your vow?"

"My word had _nothing_ to do with whom I marry!"

"And he will still not allow it! Sansa, you are _still_ the key to the North! You are the oldest heir to House Stark, and a _good marriage_ -"

"Enough!"

Crows and ravens and doves called out in distress and went cawing up into the grey sky. Climbing, prowling things in the godswood fled with snapping twigs and crunching leaves at the outburst. Sansa whirled to her feet in a heartbeat, breath coming out of her mouth so fast it was ripping through her lips and making them tremble. Her hands were balled at her sides and her eyes were beyond frozen or blazing or anything so poetic. 

Jonelle bit her lip and rose slowly. Almost painfully. She had failed. 

"Sansa-"

"Lady Stark," said Sansa, and Jonelle bit back her anger. Any of that thrown Sansa's way would only add to the armor of outrage she wore now. "You will address me as 'Lady Stark', Lady Jonelle, and I do not wish to talk further with you."

"This delusion will ruin you both."

She had gone too far to turn back now. In Sansa's scorn and denial, Jonelle could see the downfall of the North, hard though it was to fathom for her. She had grown to care for Sansa as if she were a sister, but if turning her mind from this madness meant she had to sacrifice that, then so be it.

"I think you know that, Lady Stark. You played the game for long enough, or learned from the players. You will need to play it for far longer. Winterfell is not the end. Not even close to it. Sandor is but a minor piece and-"

"Leave me." Sansa's words were growled out and Jonelle thought for a horrid moment that it was a good thing she was not armed. "I order you. Speak to me no more of this, or..."

Jonelle blinked and her lips parted. Now it was her turn to wear hurt and betrayal, and Sansa could see it. For a moment the girl's mask of righteous fury slipped and there was shame there, regret for words spoken so imperiously for a friend. But then she seemed to remember what taking that friend's counsel would cost her, and to Sansa... that was too much. 

"I... As you wish... Lady Stark."

She walked away and did not look back. Not even when she heard the rustling crash of leaves as Sansa collapsed back down underneath the weirwood her father and his fathers had paid such homage to. Not when she screwed her eyes shut and forced her feet forward, refusing to heed the sobs that chased her away from the girl so much depended on, and from whom so much had yet to be taken.

 

**SANSA**

She was expecting anger. Hot and flushing through her, trembling through her hands until she swung and flailed against tree trunks and piles of leaves. She could have screamed though it would have brought the guards; cursed long and loud just like Sandor and vomited up her outrage in a torrent of harsh, ugly words. Guilt... yes, that would have come, too. The crushing weight of all she had turned her back on smashing her into the ground and killing her legs until she never wanted to rise again, to be seen again, though mere absence would not stay wagging tongues. Sadness. Grief. Horror. All of those things she would have let pour from her, and all would have been of equal likelihood.

But Sansa did not expect to feel so... hollow. So bereft. As if something had reached inside and torn out her guts and all that was left was a cold, yawning void that was without anything of tears and blood and soul and fire. She placed a hand over her chest, just to make sure her heart was still beating. 

It was, for all the good it had done her.

She closed her eyes and squeezed the last drops of tears from her eyes. She'd broken within moments of Jonelle leaving, hating her, hating herself, hating the whole damn world for making her feel like this. _Forcing_ her and _lecturing_ her and _never_ letting her be. Oh, her armor and her shield had come up fast, just as Sandor would raise his own, but what had been achieved? She'd thrown away a friend and when she'd left, her full figure rustling away from her and vanishing into the snow-dusted trees, not an ounce of her concerns left with her. 

_They jape of you. They titter and mutter and laugh their coarse laughter about what you and Sandor-_

Sansa opened her eyes and it was as if she had forgotten how to weep. She seemed to have no more tears left in her. She gazed into the black water of the pool before the weirwood, edges crusted and glazed with ice, but the bulk of it rippling softly with each fresh breeze. She saw herself in black marble, tears frozen and shining on her cheeks, but immobile. No friends came after them, and Sansa felt only that ice in her guts to match the frozen leaves around her. 

She was the heir to Winterfell. She held the loyalty of the Northern houses. She had an army under her command, for the love of the gods and _still_ she was being dictated to? Lords that had bent the knee to her whispered and chortled behind her back? How _dare_ they?! Each one had known a whore's stink on their cocks and yet they would judge _her_ for choosing her heart over a passionless union as heartfelt as a horse sale? Why could they not _see_?!

Slowly, like poison dripped into a jug of water, she felt hatred. Dribbling into her mind bit by bit, hissing and sizzling like boiling pitch. She could find out who they were. Bring them before the other lords in the Great Hall. Have them on their knees and beaten as she once was, humiliate them as they had done to her with their gossip. Who would stop them, after all? She was Lady of Winterfell. Stannis may call himself king and he may have her loyalty, but he would have no say over her household affairs. She could strip them bare like they said she had been stripped; tear their flesh as they'd torn at her honor. Mayhap Joffrey had the right-

Sansa's eyes went wide and her hand shot to her mouth, bile churning at the back of her throat. Gods, she was going to purge herself.

She screwed her eyes shut and tried and tried but she could not keep the hideous image from her mind. Her pale face and red hair, but with squirming lips and emerald eyes that gleamed with slavering sadism. Her beloved betrothed, may all the hells rend him for an eternity and a day for his crimes. But it had come so easily to her. That delicious, liberating realization that if she willed it, she _could_ do it, she _would_ see it come to pass. How many years had Joffrey known that? Probably so many he never questioned it, and that power had drowned whatever goodness was ever in him. 

 _That is not you_ , she reminded herself, pressing her palms to her forehead as if to squeeze the nightmare image to nothing. _You are Sansa Stark of House Stark, daughter of Ned and Catelyn, and..._

She let out a breath that was weak and shaky and steam shuddered over the black water. Troops, companies, choirs, armies were shouting in her head and she could make no sense of the words. Only the rhythm, the same familiar tone of shame and duty and honor and loyalty and... and she was so tired of it. She settled back against the cold, smooth white trunk of the weirwood. She cast her eyes skyward, as if she could gleam some wisdom for the tangle of twigs and twirling, calling red leaves and the grey clouds cloaking them all.

There was nothing up there for Sansa. Save, perhaps, the outline of the face on the weirwood. She turned and studied it. Gods, it was eerie. Her father said that the face was there long before the Starks arrived and Bran The Builder raised Winterfell around it. He said the likeness was uncanny, but waiting for them, as if some plan set in motion ages before had planted them there. Now she studied those long features, the stern jaw and the eyes forever frowning a touch, and saw Lord Eddard again.

"I never meant to shame you," she said, her voice a mere whisper. Not tear-soaked now. Gods knew she had expended plenty over her father. She had cried for days and days after his execution and thought she would drown in her sorrow. But she was alive. She had survived, where his son and wife and loyal men had not. "Please, father. Tell me..."

Again the words trailed off as her thoughts struck a wall. Some barrier she did not seek to subvert... yet she knew she could. She breathed deeply and hated herself for looking beyond her father. Beyond her family, but they were part of the-

_Whole board, sweetling. See the whole board, not just the pieces. They are to be moved and expended, as the game requires. Only winning matters, for victory in this game is survival._

Baelish. Gods help her. His words in her head, staining this place of honor and loyalty, things he could never feel even if he manipulated men who held them as true as the gods. But he had been right, damn him, and Sansa knew that. She swallowed and looked past her heart, leaving it behind and the warmth it had given her with that scared, uncouth man. She clutched the fabric over her breast and held him there for a moment.

The smell of leather and sweat and mud and that indescribable musk that was just him, raw and strong and wrapped around her. The sight of his scars and his scowl, the smile and glittering grey eyes that were all the more beautiful to her for their rarity. His voice, that scraping, animal growl that terrified men but sent tremors from her head to her core when it shifted in that subtle way when they were alone.

He was all those things and all he'd done for her. But Sansa saw, now. Saw the whole board. 

"I am the North."

She murmured the words as if they were a prayer, though they held more truth to her than desperate pleas to gods that seemed only indifferent to their struggles and triumphs. She was the Lady of Winterfell, the rallying point for an entire kingdom... and she did not have the luxury of-

"Why must it be this way?" She entreated the wooden face as if it would answer, but only a gust replied, whipping through her hood and sending strands of flaming hair tickling and dancing around her face. "The one thing I want, and I must abandon it."

 _Must_. The first time she had said the word. As if it was inviolable and her mind had been twisted to the opinions of others, as it had ever-

 _Enough_ , she thought angrily. _Enough talking yourself in circles. Jonelle was right. When it was the two of you running and hiding like outlaws, you could pretend, but that time is over. The war is not over. Your brother is held by a monster in flesh. The Others are coming. The southrons still war over the Iron Throne and yet you will need them for the coming struggle, the only struggle that matters. Gods, girl... if a marriage could save the North, would you deny it?_

Sansa rose from her blanket of stiff, bloody leaves, as if she'd been kneeling in freezing blood. She raised her hand and stroked those hard, white features. Fancied for a trembling moment that wet her eyes, that she was stroking her father's sharp face and scruffy beard that scratched her cheek when he kissed her in the morning. She smiled sadly and sniffed, little icicles tingling in her nose. Winter had come, indeed. 

She made two lists, when her father had died alone and betrayed, and her brother had met much the same end, along with her mother. All the faces and souls she remembered from her childhood, that had moulded her into the woman she was. Then all those she would never see again, taken from her, stolen by greed and cruelty and usurpers and enemies bloody and fell-handed. 

With every passing year, the lists grew more alike. She grew more alone. 

"They will not have died for nothing," she said, promising the face as her fine fingers reached the straight jaw. Putting into a handful the ocean of squabbling words that he been besieging her, taking a breath first, as if it were a trial. "There is more at stake than me. Than us."

Sansa closed her eyes and prayed that Sandor would forgive her. Gods... she almost chuckled sadly when she thought of how she'd pursued him, and verily, there was no other turn for it. He had warned her over and over, but she'd scorned his caution. Now she knew he was always right. She broke through that last wall of denial and found no satisfaction. There was none to be had. Just the cold, cloying...

Hollowness. It was still there. But there was purpose growing there now, and Sansa thought mayhap this was the first lesson of a good lady. Or a fine queen.

_This is duty._

Fresh footfalls shook her from her unwanted epiphany. Heavier than Jonelle, though, marching with a soldier's pace and purpose, and not alone.

Stannis. Unsmiling as ever, like his face was a waxen mask over his skull. Two of his knights flanked him, raging infernos emblazoned on their armor, matching the fiery heart over their king's own breast. The dour man paused in front of her and gave a curt nod of greeting. 

"Your Grace."

"Lady Stark, forgive the disturbance," he said, casting unsure eyes around the godswood. She remembered that he'd ordered the one at his own keep burned, and shuddered at the thought. "I know this is a sacred place to your people."

 _To your people_ , she repeated in his own mind. _But not to yours, and if you had your way, you'd turn this place to ash for your damned fiery god._

"It is no matter, Your Grace," she said, chirping well, a survival skill not easily forgotten with so much practice. "You would not have come had it not been important, I am sure."

"True enough, Lady Stark. We have received a raven from the Dreadfort. Bolton's Bastard has sent us his reply."

She allowed hope to kindle in her heart. Before she could help it, images of her little brother rushing back through the gate flooded through her mind, his happy grin and Shaggy loping behind him. Her arms around his skinny shoulders and his hands getting her dress damn filthy and she could not care a jot because he was whole and laughing and home. 

One look at Stannis' face, though, and she knew that would not happen. 

  

**THE STOLEN BOY**

_He was lost in a great white nothing, and he could not find his brother._

_He hurt, all over. His bone and his skin and even his fur, like it was always on fire or freezing. One leg dragged behind him, paw upturned, bone at the knee scraping through the snow and gouging a thick line wherever he went. He buried his snout in the ground over and over, but he could find no scent but endless snow and his own blood leaking out and freezing as it touched the air._

_He was scared. He was angry. He was hungry. But he could not stop._

_His little brother was out there. He knew he would be scared and alone and he wanted to save him from those dark men. Stole him from that warm little hut and chased him away with their fire and spears and bows. Left him for dead in a snow drift and dragged his brother away as he screamed for him._

_A mountain of carved and ugly rock loomed above the forest. The tops were jagged and cut like huge teeth, tearing at the cloudy sky and the fat moon as if in a frenzy. He could smell the pain in this place. The fear and the love of it that had seeped into the stones and become part of it, oozed into everyone that lived there. He could not get in. Men had made that place to withstand other men for years; beasts like him were of no concern to them._

_He threw back his head and howled, long and mournful, a single anguished note that he hoped his brother could hear-_

"Rickon...? Rickon...?"

The forest and the castle and his shaggy body blotted and burned into white as the words laid upon him like a blanket. He breathed and it was not the frost on the air, but the familiar thick, coppery warmth he'd been thrown in. He blinked his blurry eyes and saw a head bobbing before him. He couldn't make out features yet, the fog of dreams still clinging to his eyes, the torches low and her shadow hung over her face, but...

His breath hitched. Her hair! Brown and flowing and tangled all at once like a beautiful birds nest, just like Shaggy's! He reached out blindly and stroked it, wanting feel those warm, thick locks-

But they were sticky. Lank. He pulled his hand away and it stank like Shaggy's nose when he'd done eating, snout buried in the guts of a rabbit or a deer.

"Rickon... We're leaving... Rickon...?

No. No, this was wrong. He blinked, over and over, forcing the sleeping grit from his eyes and he tried to rub them hard but-

Iron on his hands. Cold stone under his numb legs. His eyes widened as he saw Osha staring down at him-

Not her eyes. Not her mouth. Her face was stretched and something writhed under it when she spoke, corners of her lips vanishing under her own mouth, and her eyes... not warm brown... cold white shards that are yet alive, dancing and laughing and peering at him in sick expectation through-

Holes.

Ramsay Snow grinned behind his newest mask, lips like wet snakes, voice a lilting singsong.

"Fooled yoooooou...!" 

Rickon screamed and screamed but could not move, and all the while Ramsay's high laughter mingled and supped his horror, turning all the air it touched to filth. 


	38. Chapter 38

**STANNIS**

_My Lord Father may have been murdered at your turncloak hands, but you have not won._

_I have Rickon Stark, the last male heir to Winterfell, and as long as I do, I have the bloodline of the North in my hands._

_You may have taken that nest of wolves and ruins, but I have the Dreadfort. You have no tricks to overcome me here, no time to starve me out as you did my ancestors, and no men to brace my high walls._

_Recognize my rightful claim as Warden Of The North and bend the knee to my house. Only then will Rickon Stark be returned to you. Until then, he will remain my guest, and the skin of his wildling bitch will amuse us both for quite some time. As will the pile of dribbling flesh I've made out of Stannis' errand boy, now missing even more fingers._

_Renounce your vows to Stannis and his fire god. Return them to Bolton and myself, and I will be merciful. Do this not, and the boy will die like the rest of his brothers, I will laugh from my battlements as House Stark withers, and Winter freezes Stannis and his army to death._

_Ramsay Bolton, Trueborn Lord of Winterfell and The Dreadfort_

"Truly, we deal with a bastard run mad..."

Stannis tossed the parchment across the table and its rustle on the polished wood was lost in the chorus of grim grunts and low, mocking laughter. Lords lined either side, from the Umbers and the mountain chiefs to the Florents and Stannis' sellsword captains. Wrinkled brows shook and beards writhed with scornful smirks. A bastard, no matter what any puppet southron king said, without allies or army, with only the walls of his castle to aid him, and he sought to dictate _terms_?

Twas madness, yes, but Stannis could see the fruits of that insanity in some scattered faces of his impromptu court. Eyes flickered to friends, flashing concerns and doubts, unsaid but potent warnings. Others scratched their faces and stared holes into the plates and cups in front of them. Division. That was the bastard's strategy. Tear them between bargaining for Rickon and leaving with him; following Stannis and dealing with a very real devil for the last male Stark.

 _As so mentioned, too_ , Stannis thought, taking a sip of wine and waiting for the brief hubbub to cease. _He may have little leverage, but what he does possess, he knows to use._

"Take this scrap and burn it, yer grace," Donar Umber said in his customary boom, mayhap trying to ape his imprisoned brother a little too much. "The bastard won't dare harm the young lord. He has nowhere to run, no place to hide. Any harm befalls Ned's lad, and he knows the North will tear him apart."

"Then why would he send such a message?" Lord Florent said, eyes sharp and narrowed at Umber's careless tone. "He would not purposelessly antagonize us unless he was confident in doing so, meaning-"

"He seeks division, or time, or rash action from us," said Lady Jonelle, voice not quite as sharp but easily as firm. Stannis noted, however, that she was a few seats removed from Lady Sansa's side, as had become customary. Had some spat broken between the two of them? "All we need glean from this scrap is that he will not hand over Lady Stark's brother, not willingly."

"Aye, but what's to be _done_?" The Wull said, quaffing enough ale to get a small man drunk in one great go, suds clinging to his rough beard. "Do we let him rave in his castle with his prisoners? With The Ned's boy? Or do we go and root him out from under his stone?"

"We do not have the men to undertake such a siege," said Robett Glover, shaking his head as he pondered the task at hand. "Much as the words choke me, the bastard is _right_ on that point. It took years to starve the Boltons out of that shit heap last time it was besieged. To do it by force, with our numbers run down after the bloody battle here... we would wreck our army in the doing, and leave ourselves weaker."

 _My army_ , Stannis thought instinctively. _They keep forgetting that. They swore their vows and bent their knees, and yet they act as if we are equals._

"Lady Sansa," he said, turning to the woman at his side, hands folded in her lap and... remarkably composed, he had to admit. He had thought her lips would be squirming and her eyes wet with all the mention of her brother, but there she sat, as serene as Selyse. "These lords have sworn themselves to you, as you have to me. Can you give a single voice to their many thoughts?"

The Lady of Winterfell marshalled her words properly before speaking them. When she did, she was on her feet and swept her blue gaze across every face before she did. Stannis' gaze flickered behind her briefly and noted that her towering, black-clad sentinel had returned. Moving a little more stiffly, mayhap, like a giant doll that was in dire need of oil, but his eyes were still quick, and his bearing strong.

Sandor caught his gaze and held it with his customary impudence. Stannis sniffed lightly and turned back to his liegewoman.

_Another who forgets his place. Soon to be corrected._

"My lords. Ramsay Snow is a canker on the North, and we must purge it. Torrhen's Square and Moat Cailin are still held by the ironborn. We have heard no word from the Wall in days. By now the Iron Throne will have heard of our reclaiming this castle and then the Lannister's and their allies will turn their attention to us. We have much to face, and we cannot do so with the Bastard of Bolton sitting in his castle, surrounded by Dreadfort men still loyal to him. That alone gives him control over the eastern shores, able to sortie out as he wishes."

"My lady," Lord Stout said, rising in respect, soft voice mirroring it. "He left for the Dreadfort with six hundred men. A fine number, but not enough, I think to cause such damage-"

"And he also has my brother, my Lord Stout," Sansa said, and Stannis noted a fresh iron under her tone. Stout sat down again without being told. He simply knew he'd been overruled, and Stannis felt his teeth snarl together in his head. They respected her words, this girl who had seen only two battles, and not he, who had survived a dozen and won them, too. "I cannot ignore that. My duty is to my family and my people and my kingdom, and Rickon Stark is the heir to the North. If Ramsay will not _give_ him to us, we must _take_ him."

"But how are we to _do_ that?" Lord Florent said as he rose, earning a row of glowers from the Northern lords. "My lady, the army is weakened and recovering, and much of it will be needed to defend Winterfell. The Dreadfort is... at least five days march, with the weather so pernicious, and once we arrive, how many days can we endure before starvation and cold whittles us down to nothing?"

"Lord Florent does make good points, Lady Stark," Stannis said carefully, ignoring the proud smile from the Stormlander. If he'd spoken naught but foolery, Stannis would have said so. "We have no siege equipment, and no clever way into the castle this time. It would come to a bloody reckoning or a starving, and we have not the numbers for the first and not time enough for the second." 

Stannis did not think it proper for a king to have to look up at anyone, but he indulged the girl. Better than than order her to sit and give the Northern lords one more thing to grouse about. 

"We must wait, Lady Stark, until our numbers are replenished."

"He has my _brother_ , Your Grace," Sansa said, yet with a great deal more respect that the Umber. Then again, Stannis knew her tongue had been well-honed to deliver pleasantries, and make them ring true. "I cannot leave him in the hands of a monster."

"That decision was made when you first set out from White Harbor, Lady Stark, with Manderly banners at your back, and gathered House Cerwyn to you on the way to me," said Stannis with barely a pause for breath. No point dragging out the argument, after all. This was not his only matter of import. "You knew Lord Roose would have your brother taken to the Dreadfort, most like watched over by his bastard. This has unfolded as you knew it would, and now you and your lords must endure it, at least for now."

Silence fell across them all. Stunned and simmering with anger, all of it directed at him with disbelieving Northern eyes. Stannis looked up and found Sansa's eyes swimming now, a potent mix of outrage and sorrow drenching them. He blinked, recalling his words and wondering what could have caused such sharp offence. Did the girl imagine he would allow his army to destroy itself to save one boy, however close to her? The only army he _had_ , and the only one the North could rely on? 

_She had the choice in White Harbor to stay hidden, and yet she seized her moment to rally the North around her, as Wyman like intended to do with Rickon. Did she imagine there would be no consequences for that?_

"You'd tell our lady what she must endure?" Of course, it was Umber on his feet first, brown and grey beard bristling with anger as he braced his hands on the table, glaring down it without care. "I think you go too far, yer grac-" 

"He does not, Lord Umber... though I thank you for your concern."

More shock. More murmurs and whispers and faces stricken with surprise. Stannis had to bite down on the impulse to express his own. The words came from Sansa, her head bowed as she swallowed back tears, and he could hear the scrape and creak of black armor as her sworn shield reacted to her discomfort. Again, Stannis flashed a glance his way. The huge man looked fit to start swinging, he was sure of it. 

"I... I have a greater duty, my lords," Sansa went on, raising her gaze in a quick intake of breath, steadying herself with it. Tears shone but did not fall, as if her own will held them in place. "King Stannis is right, in this respect. There is so much to consider; one boy, however noble, however cl... close... to my heart-"

She stumbled and Stannis saw a swathe of Northern faces twist and look away. Such love for this girl, and the memory her red hair and the softly swaying banner behind her conjured. Many of them had not even met Rickon; would not even recognize him. Yet if she ordered, they would march through more snow and hunger and blood to save him. His own would have to be cowed and convinced... but not the Northerners. Not with her. 

"And my duty, is to keep the North _safe and strong_. All of it. But that... that cannot be done with an army still recovering, and without the numbers to take the Dreadfort. New recruits will need to be found. Siege weapons constructed. Levies raised and we have yet to receive ravens from outside the North." Her eyes lost their focus for a moment and Stannis did not see a plot or ploy in them. He saw sadness, and felt a brief stir of sympathy. Then it was gone. "I would love more than anything to ride into the Dreadfort and batter down it's walls and slay the bastard and take my brother. But this is not a song, and we are not gods. We must wait."

She sat back down and the hall became so quiet that even the squeak of her chair seemed to cut through the air like a whetstone across a sword. Northern lords were staring into their cups as if they could see their unseen lordling tortured beyond their grasp. The Stormlanders seemed to sit straighter, proven right and imagining there was some victory in that. Stannis' jaw worked for a moment in irritation. Peacocks. Loyal but blind. Focused more on proving their superiority over the Northerners than on how they might yoke their strength towards a goal of worth. 

"Once word has spread, our ranks will swell, Lady Stark." Jonelle looked down the table and braved one of those smiles that Stannis knew only women seemed to share. It was... an intimate thing and he did not understand it. But he knew it was powerful, in its way. A means of solidarity, and next to him, Sansa smiled wetly back. "I think the bastard _mad_ , but not _stupid_ , and he would be so to harm Lord Rickon. The boy is his only shred of influence over us. Without him, he is a dead man."

"Aye... he will be kept alive..."

Lord Wyman's voice was a rasp, dry and harsh and forced from his lips, not just spoken. He had to swallow hard after every sentence but all listened carefully to him. All from the North anyway, and Stannis, too. Few lords held more influence among the North, and Stannis knew he would need to mark the man carefully. He had plotted well and without remorse against Roose after he'd bent the knee; there was nothing stopping him from doing the same against Stannis. 

_Kings in the North. Always the same rebellious dream, and I do not think they have yet waken from it._

"He will... not be treated like a guest... I fear... but he will be... kept alive. Kept useful. And when we are... replenished... reinforced... we can... rescue him."

That thought seemed to add more color to the girl's pale, spent features and Stannis kept his own counsel as far as that plan went. Rickon Stark was a minor concern. The North was unified, and behind Lady Stark, not her pup of a brother. That was all he required. He would dearly have loved to have the bastard's head on a spike along side his father's, but such had not transpired. Six hundred men would be a hindrance, but they could not take Winterfell. They could not do anything but prick their sides with a needle instead of thrusting a dagger into their hearts. 

"It is decided then," he said in a louder tone, shaking the northerners from their foul, somber mood. "We will repeat our demands to the bastard, and nothing more. We cannot save Rickon Stark, but we can reinforce our numbers until we are ready to march on his prison. Until then, we maintain Winterfell and spread the word that the North is no longer under sway of House Bolton." 

Stannis looked up to Lady Stark and gave her a curt nod. He couldn't manage a smile; it would look odd on his stern features, his wife and Davos always said so. Melisandre thought otherwise but Stannis had grown oddly tired of her ceaseless flattery of him, powerful and wise though she was. It was one thing to shower compliments when they were earned; but saying a man like him he had a "charming" smile was such an obvious lie it threw all other platitudes into question.

So he used his voice. He softened it, drew out some of the iron and imagined she were Shireen. Gentle and good-hearted girl that his daughter was, deserving of more attention but duty... always duty. Tearing him away from her.

"Ramsay will die, Lady Stark. Your brother will come back. But the timing must be right, and until then, we have a higher duty."

"Aye, Your Grace..."

She flicked a look at Sandor, chin moving just a fraction towards him, as if to draw Stannis' eye-

-and then, once he had seen it, her blue eyes were on him again. Sharper. Knowing. 

"Beyond what our hearts would wish."

Stannis blinked. Thrice. In quiet, stoic astonishment.

"... aye, my lady. That we must." 

 

**SANSA**

It was getting easier, and that frightened her.

She thought back to her room at New Castle, how fast she'd fallen apart when there were no judging eyes on her and the full weight of her words crashed into her mind. Dooming her brother. Siding against him, or certainly feeling like it. Choosing... what, exactly? Herself over him? The game over one piece on the board? Now she had done it again, reversed her position in the space of a dozen breaths and gods, that was worrying her more now than what that change had meant.

_The lords will question me again. Not just over Sandor, but whether or not I am a flighty girl easily turned about by Stannis, a king none of them want. I cannot do that again._

_He is still there_ , a firmer rasp shuddered across her mind as she walked from the Great Hall. _He will stay there. In the clutches of a maniac._

_There is nothing to be done. I cannot conjure armies from the ground!_

_You could have tried!_

"My Lady...?"

She blinked and Sandor was at her side, peering down at her, heavy brow a wrinkled mess of concern. Sansa managed a smile and nodded, flicking a glance back to the ribald table of bickering, debating noblemen she'd left behind. All of them perceptive in their way, when it came to weakness and advantage, but none of them saw her turmoil. Sandor had done so without even a word being spoken.

"I'm... It's fine, Sandor."

"He won't stay there long," he said lowly, hair falling down and framing his face, hiding the tiny smile just for her. "That fucking bastard won't kill him. He needs him."

"How do we even know he lives?" Her voice trembled in a way it didn't when she had addressed them all. Showing such weakness to that group... no, unthinkable. But to him? "The bastard could already have killed him and-"

"But he hasn't," Sandor said, arm reaching out for her shoulder. "He wouldn't bloody dare and-"

His arm stopped. His gaze slid from her to the long table, where a smattering of beady eyes watched them like hawks would a pair of plump pigeons. Sandor scowled but drew back his hand, straightening up and taking a step back. Every inch the stoic shield. Nothing more. 

Sansa bit her lip, nodding her understanding of more than just his words. She had visited him when he was recovering, but there seemed to be a fresh wall between them to replace the one they'd worked so hard to pull down. His stoic detachment had returned, it seemed. He smiled less. He didn't tease and much as she longed for the words, no "little bird" or "little hawk" fell from surly lips. Sandor was her shield again, nothing more. 

Already Sansa felt herself mourning, but also churning in her soul. Questions circling and pestering her. Who had spoken to him? Was it a lord? A knight? Gods forbid, Stannis? Faces and their likely motives rose and fell in her scrutinies but none held their ground. Mayhap it had been Jonelle as well but-

"My lady?" He spoke again and gestured to the hallway. "Your chambers, aye?"

She nodded, and they went along they way, air filled with the words they weren't speaking. She kept her hands folded and her eyes straight, but there was a glassy sheen to them she could not foist away. They had come so far and surmounted so much, and now they were... as they had been. In the Red Keep. The Hound escorting Joffrey's betrothed, two feet and a thousand leagues away from her. Every man that passed earned a glare; every woman a piercing look, as if he expected assassins to spring from laundry baskets and pails of dirty water. They turned a corner and Sansa felt her heart thudding in her chest, rattling her bones and threatening to shake tears from her eyes.

_This isn't fair. This isn't how I thought it would be._

She knew, after talking with Jonelle, that things could not be as they were. Distance would have to be laid between them. She understood that, and decided it; swore it, in her own vague way, before the weirwood of her family. It seemed to simple and obvious in hr own mind, but now he had returned to her side, she was besieged without him even raising a finger to lay an assault. The familiar, comforting clink of his armor as he walked, the swift, regimented march of his boots. The way he towered at her side and protected her, every swish of his cloak seeming to pause from enveloping her entirely and wrapping her in-

His scent. That most of all. Sweat and leather and mud in his boots and rough, cheap soap. Sansa of old would have wrinkled her nose at such a base peasant aroma; now but a breath of it conjured him to her mind, him and all they had done together and no, she couldn't do this-

_You can. You're doing it right now. This is all in your head._

"My lady?"

"Sansa."

They were before her door and Sansa stood in front of him with her gaze tilted up. She could look at his face. It wasn't some impossible, heartbreaking task, and thinking it so wouldn't aid her. She rested her eyes on the beard grown full and thick after days in bed; grey eyes crushed by his customary frown; the crown of ink black hair that fell across half his face like a veil, but did nothing to bar the heat of his gaze. His lips and his cheeks, even the one so burned and ruined it was a hollowed mess of blackened muscle. Sansa saw all of this and when her eyes had finished roaming, she spoke without a tremor.

"You may address me as 'My Lady Sansa', if you wish."

His mask softened, and she'd come to know it well. A ceaseless glower that burned and crackled like the fire that maimed him years before. Nothing but stony contempt and stoic ruthlessness. But in that empty corridor, she saw his grey gaze blur from side to side, his brow smooth and his bearing seem to almost... diminish. His lip twitched at one side. When his eyes turned back to her, he was Sandor. Not the Hound. 

"That wouldn't be too clever, my lady. People would talk if I called you that."

"People are talking already."

"Aye, so I've heard."

"Who?"

"Niall. Lady Jonelle to you, hmm?"

She blinked. In fact, she could have measured that conversation in the fluttering of her eyes and yet in that time some and much and all had changed. He knew what the gossips whispered and chuckled over. Gods, she should have guessed it had been Niall. The two of them, so impossibly alike, yet bound in their odd journey, now forged in blood and steel and their mad dance with The Stranger during the taking of her home. She smiled and snorted softly at the absurdity of it all, that finally her Sandor should find a comrade whom he could confide in.

His distance was not just some aberration of his healing, but a firm decision. Just like her own. 

He hand rose, wool sleeve rustling softly as it did. She hesitated but a moment, then wrapped her fingers around the hard, cold metal at his arm. Sansa could feel him under there. She was sure of it. But when the image and memory of their stolen nights threatened to rise, she blinked hard and exhaled slowly.

"Yes. I wish it did not have to be so."

That common touch at her cheek. Hand made so well for war so gentle with her, tipping her eyes upward when they fell down in despair.

He smiled. It was a rare thing, and like all rarities, beautiful to those who could appreciate it.

"Yer not alone in that, little hawk. But it's the ri..." His words stumbled and she remembered other ones he'd spoken her. But he continued, relentless in everything. "Right thing."

"There is more than just us."

Sandor's smile became a smirk that leaked over onto his maimed side, pulling up the mangled flesh there as if a maester was studying a corpse, vanished flesh showing his teeth far into his mouth. But Sansa smiled back. She barely saw the horror of it anymore. She had seen far worse in the guise of comely features; she would not be fooled again.

"Unfortunately."

Then his hand fell away and Sansa's heart shook in her chest for fear it would be the last time. But her own did the same, and she wondered if his own wounded organ shuddered alike. He breathed deep, almost relieved, and his shoulders were square and his bearing straight and he was her pillar again. Her shield.

"You will remain in the hallway?"

"Aye, my lady." 

"Your wounds do not pain you too much? I can bring you a stool or-"

"Shields do not _sit_ , my lady," he said, and Sansa smiled at the hint of a tease, the flicker of a smile and the dance of amusement in eyes so unused to the feeling. Things had changed. Some and much and all. But they could change back, too. "They _stand_ , and I'm bloody well capable."

"As you wi-"

Marching feet sent his eyes snapping away from her and his hand to his sword before she'd even recognized the sound. Shadows from around the corner to her chambers, bobbing and looming and stretched on the stone like stains. Sandor slid in front of her and Sansa felt her brow furrow at his concern. Who would dare attempt harm on her here, of all places?"

"Ah, Lady Stark."

"Your Grace."

_Well, **harm** would be a little excessive. **Rudeness** wouldn't be too wide of the mark._

Stannis stood there, hand tucked into his belt by the thumb, as comfortable and commanding as he would be in Dragonstone. Sansa felt that burn in her guts. He was a king with a borrowed army and no crown or throne, and yet-

_Yet you bent the knee. You vowed your loyalty and support, and thus you vowed the North. Without him, you would not be home._

She gave a bright smile that creased her eyes but did not touch them. All true, but she did not have to like it.

"I wished to speak with you, away from the lords," he said, staring at Sandor for a long moment with dark eyes like sunset water. "It is of a private matter."

"My shield will remain in the hallway if-"

"My lady, if I may?"

Sansa had not seen King Stannis astonished very often, though the last had been quite recent. The man's face was so numb of emotion that it was only with twitches of his jaw and fast blinks that he could express the feeling, and she saw that again when her underling stabbed through her words with his own. She turned to Sandor in surprise and saw a fresh hesitation there. Some other incident gave birth to it, though. Confusion, in the way he wet his lips and cast his eyes down, frowning at the floor.

"Sandor?"

"I have... something, that I wish to tell the both of you. I have thought on it long nights and... I suppose there is no point putting it off any longer."

Something squirmed in Sansa's guts. Sandor unsure was not a comforting sight. She swallowed and saw the same bewilderment in Stannis, captured by the bemused cock of his head topped with thinning hair. 

"Can it wait, Clegane?"

"It has waited long enough," Sandor said, and Sansa fancied he waited just long enough to be considered damn impudent before adding, "Your Grace."

Stannis breathed in slow and exhaled the same way, as if he was holding his patience by a thread. Sansa felt her hands ball into ridiculous fists, soft little lumps knobbled with knuckles. What would she do? Strike her king for being short with a man who dared all to brawl with him, in words or body?

"What does it concern?"

Sandor answered Stannis' question by looking at Sansa, and as he did, his challenging stare softened again, just with the half-rotation of his neck. Guilt. She would know that well enough. She'd seen it often on her tear-streaked face, gazing miserably at her from her mirror, locked in her chambers in the Red Keep. There was no weeping with Sandor, though. Just a weight that was pushing down on him that he was desperate to be rid of, yet feared to impart. 

 _Not Stannis_ , she tried to plead with only her eyes. _We have come to our decision, counseled wisely. We need not draw this man into our business any more._

"Lady Stark's brother, Your Grace."

"Ah, the bastard on the Wall?" Stannis said easily, sounding almost disappointed by such an anticlimax. He scratched under his chin and ignored the sharp look Sansa shot him. His disdain brought up bad memories of her own for Jon; treatment and neglect she had shown that he had never earned, that no man did simply for being born as he was. "I have heard no word from him, but-"

"Not that one, Your Grace."

"Rickon? The matter has been-"

"No, gods _above_ ," Sandor said, rolling his eyes skyward as if he were surrounded by lackwits and children and Sansa had to bite down hard on her lip to stop herself from grinning. It would have been worth it alone just to see Stannis' twin bodyguards go red with outrage. "Her other brother. Brandon."

Now Stannis frowned, walking closer, knights clanking at his flanks. "You have news of him?"

Sansa heard Sandor sigh, saw him shrug and mumble out his words like a naughty boy forced to confess before his parents. Sansa's lips parted in surprise. Now this was not something she had expected: Sandor Clegane, struggling to find his coarse tongue.

"In a... manner of speakin'..."

 

**SANDOR**

He told them everything and the more he talked and the more they listened, the greater a bloody fool he felt.

Especially when they started asking him questions. 

"These visions..." Stannis said, voice careful and reeking of disbelief. "Was there time mentioned? Some hint as to when these... things, would come to pass?"

"You mean like a bloody date behind them?"

"Sandor, it's a fair-"

"I don't know!" Sandor couldn't help the snarl, nor the note of helplessness that crept in there with it. Sansa's lips curled in sympathy; Stannis just glowered, but since when was that unusual? "I only know what I saw. I was in a bloody snowy place in front of a cave. Someone was speaking to me. He showed me all those... things. Visions, dreams, I dunno what, or when, or why. Then I saw... I went somewhere else, and I saw Lady Sansa's brother. He talked to me, and told me that more trouble was coming."

"What kind of trouble?"

"I don't know. But enough to threaten Lady Sansa, and she's got a bloody army around her."

Stannis reclined in his chair, hand caressing the day's stubble on his chin. Sansa was on her bed, eyes flitting between the hands folded in her lap and Sandor's face. Her own was placid, composed, a highborn at repose... but her eyes pierced him. Stabbed through his confusion and discomfort and questioned without words.

_She knows you're hiding something._

"Clegane," Stannis said, sliding back into his regal tone so quick that Sandor wanted to throw something at him. But his lady had made a vow, and he was as bound to keep it as she was. Besides, how would he react, if he were sitting in that chair and had all that madness verbally vomited over him? "There is no way for you to substantiate this. These could have easily been fever dreams, a malady caused by the maester's potions-"

"You think I don't know what _those_ feel like, yer grace?" Sandor snorted and gestured to himself. "This body's as many maester's and cups of poppy milk as it has battles. I _know_ what those dreams feel like, and what the poppy makes you see when it puts you under. This wasn't the same. This was..."

He shook his head and cursed himself and his stupid soldier's brain. Fuck did he know about... using the right words? Making someone see the truth of his own eyes with just his mouth? Steel and fists and killing, that was what he knew, what he was good at. Now he felt like a savage before the civilized, grunting and miming his thoughts because he didn't have the damned letters or learning to make himself _plain_. He knew that the boy's visions couldn't just stay locked in his head. He was but one man, and they were portents that could affect kingdoms. Sandor had to tell Stannis, and Sansa, the two highest ranks he was aware of in authority and... otherwise. 

The warrior bowed his head for a moment and forced the unwanted images from his mind. He path was set. His choice had been made. Now he knew she had come to the same conclusion, and that... that made it better. Easier.

_Keep telling yourself that._

"This was _real_ , your grace," he said, trying to say the last words like he actually meant them for a change. Stannis was many things; graceful was not among them. "I'm not a damn wych or drooling prophet from the wilds. I don't know what any of it means. But I knew you had to be informed. Whatever the boy showed me, it was... it was big. Bigger than just one man."

 _Bigger than just us_. The words murmured through his mind and Sandor ground his teeth. Aye, that seemed to be a recent theme around Winterfell.

Stannis stared at him until the man thought he would become uncomfortable, but he did not. Sandor just stared back, decades of insolence keeping the steel in his eyes to match their color. Finally the king rose to his feet and slid his thumb back into his belt, tipping up his chin, a man with his mind made.

"I have an advisor in these matter, Clegane. A woman, name of Melisandre. It was she that brought the faith of R'hllor to these kingdoms and brought my eyes to my destiny. She is well-schooled in such affairs." He stepped closer to Sandor, a fair half-foot his lesser and having to crane his neck to keep his gaze, but Sandor had to deny, the man had iron in it, much as his own. "I know you don't follow the faith. So be it. But doubt not her knowledge. She will discern the truth behind these visions."

"Where is she?"

"The Wall, with my daughter and Ned Stark's bastard. Her... abilities-" he paused and his eyes lost their sheen of uniform confidence as he searched for the word. Clearly there were things Stannis did not understand as much as he wished, though he still used them well enough. Sandor could see more than just confusion in that beat, though. Doubt. Something else. Something gnawing at the Fire King. "-are stronger there, for some reason. Mayhap because the old magic of her beliefs is concentrated there."

Sandor squeaked and ground, armor moving as he shrugged. What the bloody hell did he know about magic? He didn't even know it was real until a dozen days before, but now he'd seen it. He flicked a glance to Sansa and some other purpose bubbled in him. He felt torn in twain even as he stood at attention, wanting so much to shove this man, his ruler, out of the way and hold her, but behind the wild impulse was something wilder, born from feelings far fresher.

"I will send a raven to The Wall, and she will tell me what she thinks."

Sandor's heart beat faster. Shadows were swimming in his mind, thoughts not yet given form or words but just impetus, springing from his fresh convictions. Sansa. Again in his eye. The curve of her jaw and the brightness of her eyes, killing him and resurrecting him. Sandor swallowed harder than he needed to. The thoughts grew louder, fragments shattering backwards into a whole.

"Mayhap she could be convinced to come to Winterfell, but I would prefer not to interfere with her rites. They are... precise, and only she-"

The thoughts came together in words and they were unleashed before Sandor could find a bind for them, eyes swinging back to Stannis before he could help it. 

"What about if I went to The Wall?"

Sansa's head snapped up as if someone had punched her in the jaw. Her eyes were wide and Sandor forced himself to keep his eyes on Stannis. There was a rush of breath, high and muted, from the Lady of Winterfell, and he ignored that, too. He could scarce believe the words, less that they'd shot from his own throat. 

"You are Lady Stark's sworn shield," Stannis said, like he was imparting knowledge Sandor didn't already fucking know. "For you to leave her side would be a breaking of your vows, would it not?"

"If Lady Stark would..."

He paused. He knew it was dangerous, such hesitation, but the words would not form on his throat. His heart strangled and slayed them before they could form and he had to swallow and raise fresh response. Sandor cleared his throat and kept his gaze steady. Stannis was hawk and snake both, watching for weakness, any hint of the gossip he was sure the king had heard as much as anyone else.

"Would release me, from my vows to her, it would-"

"No."

Sandor's teeth clenched hard until he heard them crack and crunch in his skull. _Gods damn it all, girl..._

A rustle of fabric and restrained fury and Lady Sansa was on her feet, walking over to them both. A look at her face and Sandor was sure she would strike him when she paused, but instead she just gripped her hands together and spoke her words, not even sparing him a glance, eyes fixed on Stannis.

"Sandor is the finest warrior in Winterfell, I think that much has been made plain by the battle to take it. It was he who slayed Lord Bolton. He who led the brave men that usurped the gatehouses. He who held them and nearly died for me, and for this place." 

Sandor knew his heart should have swelled, and it did, but there was bitterness poisoning his pride and he hated the feeling. _This is wrong_ , he thought. _I should feel naught but pride that one such as her should praise me so. But now I just want her to shut up and let me leave._

Just as badly, he knew Stannis would not just see a highborn lady keeping an able fighter close. He would see truth in the lies that had spread about them. Lady Sansa, or the _former_ Lady Sansa in their eyes, keeping her dog in her bed no matter what.

"It is your decision, Lady Stark. Your household is not my affair."

He should have left it there. He didn't need to say anything more, the cause did not allow it, but Sandor never knew just how deep Stannis' concern ran with his Lady. His shoulders relaxed a touch, expecting a thorough tongue-lashing from Sansa but nothing more, and then the king continued, voice just as measured and casual.

"But mayhap Clegane's absence would aid in squashing any gossip about the two of you. I have heard tell of such, I am sad to say, Lady Stark."

Sandor had to try very, very hard not to kill the man where he stood. A thousand grotesqueries rode screaming through his mind. Stannis laughing, insane as that image was. Stannis pouring drinks for men telling him hideous things about his little bird. Stannis whispering and muttering, spreading the lie like pox or red fever. Stannis smirking at the idea, even inside himself, when he spoke with such courtesy to Sansa.

He looked to her and the mental urge became physical. He kept his hands at his side and fingers curled within his gauntlet, metal fingers scraping against his steel palm, nearly shaking with fury. Her lip trembled and her eyes... they didn't look away. He was so proud of her, not acting like a girl, but a woman grown and forged to face those hard words. She tilted up her chin and regarded Stannis coolly.   


"I do not pay heed to gossip, Your Grace. I learned from my time in the Red Keep that the most disgusting lies will spring even from innocent names, and those sworn to them."

Many a man, lord or common, would have been cowed by the words and tone, but Stannis was neither. He was King and Prophet both, and Sandor saw that conviction give him the will to say, "But rumors can be damaging, Lady Stark. They can weaken a noblewoman such as yourself, and I would not have my strongest Northern ally brought low."

"I will consider your counsel carefully, Your Grace."

Stannis' lips squirmed briefly at the deflection, but he knew as well as Sandor that nothing more could come from heaping on pressure. He glanced at Clegane and so much was shot across the air in that blink. After a moment he nodded curtly. 

"I will send a raven nonetheless, Lady Stark. To see if the Lady Melisandre is amenable, should you decide to release Clegane, and if not, that she will review these visions."

"My thanks, Your Grace."

Steel on wood, hammering on the door, and Sandor's hand moved instinctively to his sword hilt. Stannis jerked his head towards it, barking out, "Come!" One of his knights opened wide the portal and stood to attention. "Yes?"

"Maester Varun says more ravens have arrived, Your Grace. Some important news."

"Indeed." King Stannis nodded his farewell to Sansa, ignoring her sworn shield as only a highborn could. "Lady Stark..."

"Your Grace..."

He left the room, but the door was left open. Sandor wondered if there was a hint in such a gesture. Was Stannis capable of such subtlety? The man was as blunt and brusque as a blacksmith's hammer, but even a hammer could make finery, if used properly.

_No more closed doors. No more secrets. He knows, he knows..._

He listened to the scrape and pound of feet and armor recede and felt a strange, icy churning in his guts. Fear. He'd not felt it for some time, and it did not show on his broken face, but it was there all the same, and Sandor knew why. The Lady of Winterfell was glaring at him in naked, trembling fury, and his only support was leaving him. And when the footsteps finally vanished-

"Do you wish to leave me? To break your vows?"

Sandor did not look away. He tried to feel some shame, but he could not conjure it to his face. His lips pressed and pouted and ground but he would not turn from this. She was beautiful and radiant to his eyes; more of both than he ever thought he would be lucky enough to see. But if he stayed, he would poison the air around her and Sandor would rather die than tear down everything she had suffered for, simply by remaining at her side.

Die or leave. Both would be the same to him. 

"Neither. But I must do both, if you are to be safe."

"Strange thought, coming from a sworn shield."

"It's not so bloody simple, my lady, not-"

"Sansa!"

Now he looked away, because of the pain her heard. The plea, the sheer damned  _desperation_ , and he felt as responsible for that as for the rest of it. Her hand fluttered forward and rested on his shoulder. The last maid who'd loved Sandor had died decades before; after Annalyn, he'd neither expected nor truly wanted any affection. Just to be allowed his vengeance, and then a swift death, with enough wine and killing to pass the time before the first.

Now was a maiden before him, eyes pleading, face flushed and on the brink of tears. Her hand slid from his shoulder and he felt warmth creep up his neck with it, rest on the wasted, ugly side of him. Brush past his hair until he felt the scrape of her fingertips under his ear, Summer lightning tingling through his face. Casting light on memories buried.

"My name is 'Sansa'."

His voice was small and it shook a little, like the hairs that trembled and danced around his head as he spoke, head shaking, eyes down.

"I cannot call you that anymore. Stannis knows. Men like him don't speak unless they _know_."

She was silent. That was worse than screaming, in its way. Her thumb caressed the spot under where his ear should  have been and Sandor felt that same pulling, wrenching sensation, as if he were two men running in different directions. One wanted to flee from her, cut his losses, and hers, and rid herself of the massive, hideous problem he knew he was. The other wanted to gather her up and vanish them both from this place. Take her across the Narrow Sea to Braavos, or the Summer Isles. Anywhere there were no lions or stags or squids or dragons. 

The silence did not last forever. Nor could the fantasy.

"I will not release you. And you will not desert."

She didn't even need to attach a "would you?" to her words, and Sandor gave her a sad half-smile. "You know me too well, my lady."

Her face twitched again as if he spat a curse at her, and Sandor felt that stab in his heart again. But he knew that she would learn. They both would. Fresh wounds would pain a man to madness with every breath and shudder, but eventually, all they became was scars. White and red lines that spoke of past pain, but did not birth it any longer. Her hand was at his face and Sandor lifted his own, grasped her wrist to gently, and pulled it away.

"There are no secrets anymore, my lady."

Her lips shook like peaches in a tree and like a damn _fool_ he dared a glance at them, and that was all she needed-

She became his world within a blink, and he could taste her. Surprise was overridden in a broken moment, the swipe and wet and heat of her tongue parting his lips and he was responding, tasting her, devouring her, all his resolve of days laid to waste in a moment. He screwed shut his eyes as if in the doing he could toss away the world. His gauntlets came up and caressed her face, held it like she was a thin egg. 

His mind screamed and his body ignored it. She was pressed against him, a warm sliver of flesh he wanted to feel so badly, but barely could through armor and tunic and breeches. But where their hips met he felt the heat and the softness of her, enough to make him moan into her mouth.

_Stop this, before someone comes and-_

Sandor delved deeper into her, and the more he did, the more of himself he left behind. He had been denied too long, and that still small voice was getting further away from him. Every inch of him tingled and burned and yet only a fraction of his skin was touching hers. Even the merest scrape of her lips on his own was a symphony, a cacophony. The sounds of the castle were drowned by it, and it was that primal, feral fear of his senses stolen that drew back his head-

Both of them panting and dirtying the same air with their brief exhaustion. Blue and grey beams challenging each other across inches. She was on her toes just to kiss him, thin, pale arms around his neck like white chains. Immovable. Sandor's heart was in his mouth as she slowly dipped back onto her heels, hands trailing across his shoulder and halting on his chest. 

"There is one," she whispered, smile somewhere between wanton and sorrowful. She knew his words and their truth, but her resolve was as weak as his. "Another secret."

Sandor stepped back from her. Just one, but he may as well have let himself fall backward off a cliff, flying hundreds of feet away from her. That stolen joy died in her eyes as he moved away, fled, abandoned her, broke that closeness they'd not shared in days. But as her hands fell from his chest his arm moved without a signal and his gauntlet caught her hand. So small and puny in his metal fingers. Pale and fragile; precious and delicate where his was brawny and built to aid in killing.

Sandor turned it over. The two of them. Bare and beautiful flesh; battered and martial metal. 

_You are a weak and stupid man, Clegane. And this will ruin you both._

"Mayhap," he said, damning that voice and himself for all he cared. His lips were alive and dancing with her taste, blackberries and weak wine and days of desire unsated. Desire for him, a thought enough to baffle him. "But enough for today."

For today. The wordless hope was enough to set Sansa to beaming again and Sandor returned it, hideous as it was, false though the hope was, as the ravens cawed from the high tower and fresh news flooded in across the iron sky.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took so long, guys, I've been a bit distracted. Should get back into the swing of it soon!


	39. Chapter 39

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Writer's block has been kicking seven shades outta me for three weeks, so that's why this took so long. I know it's a fanfic site and I'm under no obligation, but I'm always humbled by how many people have embraced my first (well, second) every fanfiction story and I'd hate to disappoint anyone. Thanks for your patience.
> 
> All credit to swimmingfox for her warging text, as appears in "Sansa Washed Ashore", which I hereby decree you should all read. Oh, and for her simply being a sex-ay canine inspiration, along with the Always-Incomparable Jillypups (who is, in fact, a Beagle).

**PRINCE RICKON**

 

Out there he did not wear the skin of a prince.

With every step he took from the castle he felt the titles and expectations slough off him like dried mud, or chains falling from wrist and ankle. The Wolfswood loomed larger, until it was not just a green smear on the horizon, but trees and leaves and trunks. Mingling and mangled together, thick and vibrant and filled with watchful eyes that knew no lords and ladies.

Rickon's mouth curved into something not quite a smile. The bow was light in his hand; the quiver of arrows sat easily on his belt, as did the knives next to it. He wore little else. He wanted to feel the whipping wind hiss and bite against him. Every scratch and caress of twig and leaf. The fungus, moss and rotting foliage as he stalked.

This was where he belonged. 

When he'd walked far enough the sounds of the castle, of Men and all their works, faded to nothing, like it must have been thousands of years before, when only the Children trod the unchanged earth. He breathed in the moss and the rotting bark, air without the taint of smoke or cooked meat. Spring sun rained down in slashes and tendrils. He looked up and saw the blazing orb peeking through the canopy, like a face through boards over windows.

It was not the forest of Winter, when all was black, dead bark shorn of life and buried in sheets of freezing white the height of a giant. Now countless creatures hummed and twittered and scuttled around him, and the hunter felt not just himself, not just in his rightful place, but _alive_. The minor mountain of black fur at his side moved with eerie quiet for something so vast; even old and half-lame, Shaggydog was predator. Time away from the stone floors and mud courtyards of Winterfell was as good for the breast as it was for Rickon.

The hunter paused and bent down, hand brushing the soft, curling hair of his oldest friend as he did. The great wolf snuffled at what his man-brother was staring at; imprints in the dirt. Two long toes and two short ones at the back. The hunter's eyes narrowed and his fingers brushed the edges...

_Fresh._

The edges still sharp, not blunted or worn by time and weather. No more than an hour. He sniffed his fingers and there was that scent he knew well, the sting of it in his nostrils enough to set him to smiling again. A stag. 

"Easy now, brother," he said, voice an airless whisper to the creature staring ahead with a focus only a wolf could have. "We're close."

The direwolf gave a snuffle as if in disdain: as if _he_ needed to be told that. The hunter crushed a smile and watched the creature pad forwards softly, knees bent until he was a low, careful black wraith on the forest floor. 

Hunting and tracking were far from the same thing. Hunting was the activity entire, from the weapons you chose to finding your prey to the chase to the kill, and beyond. But tracking was a craft, a skill that demanded intense observation. Imprints and hints of passing as small as a man's finger were always scattered around, but knowing where to look for them? What they meant? Your eyes and ears could never blink nor shutter. Focus. Ruthless and unrelenting.

Rickon slid into that cold, silent place in himself like a hot sword into the smithy's trough. He could feel his heart shudder through himself, in every step, in each finger. Felt it slow and grow steady, matching his careful steps. The whirl of tedium and protocol he weathered every day was blocked out and dismissed from his mind.

He felt the purity of it. The singular purpose of flitting over the dirt, from track to track, eyes flickering to scratches on trees and fallen trunks where antlers had scraped and been sharpened. The noxious stink of a proud male marking his territory.

A wide, wavering line but a line nonetheless. A trail. Leading him onwards, a handful of steps behind Shaggy's sniffing, silent form. Birds and beasts roved and twittered but Rickon found it was the midnight wolf that was the strongest opponent to his discipline. Shaggy had been battered and bloodied by a hard life, and a longer one than many wild animal would survive, but the grace and poise... men could not hope to match it. Not a form that was built and structured solely to hunt. 

But Rickon was not most men, who could envy and idly imagine but do nothing more. All he need do was close his eyes and breath deep, reach out as the breath grew large in his mouth and body and drowned all until-

 

_he was a blade cutting through an ocean of colors. For every smell and scent a different shade and pigment, flowing around him, drenching him and yet each one was distinct. The tree he passed, two years dead, by the smell of the rot. The adder's nest behind them, musk of shed skin dry and mingling with black little droppings. Bird calls that deafened him even from a league away, each cry and chirp drawing his gaze that never missed, never failed to spy a fat lump of red or grey or brown. ThE stag. Their quarry. No thoughts but that hunt. It was easier in Shaggy's mind, to force it all away. The feel of fur, the claws he couldn't feel but knew from the hard scraping just beyond his paws in every step... the fangs and long jaws... sharp eyes and the way the sting of the stag's piss awoke some ravenous and_

 

The hardest part was coming back. A shuddering breath from lungs his own again, senses his own again, always pitifully weak compared to the sharpness Shaggy possessed. There was always that thread of consciousness between them, invisible and fine but strong as Valyrian chains. The direwolf paused and shook his head, ear flapping, confused for a moment as if waking. Rickon's fingers tightened on the bow and arrow in his hand, a fraction away from dropping both as he'd dipped deeper and deeper into Shaggy.

But he came back. He hadn't heard what happened to wargs that delved too deep into their beasts; he'd _seen it_ , and he would not abandon what he was.

No matter how tempting it was. How free and how simple.  

"Patience, brother," Rickon said again, voice the merest hiss. "Not far n-"

A brief barrage of snapping twigs that could not be any slight creature, just beyond the rise of the hill. Wolf and hunter froze, knowing what awaited their eyes beyond it. Shaggy's remaining ear flattened sharply and a wheezing growl issued forth. Rickon tilted up his chin and felt the wind blow towards them, masking their scent from the stag. He crouched lower, calves straining and pleading with him.

The moment was closer. He could taste it, sharp and quivering against his gums and with one hand he bid Shaggy to stay. The black monster growled lowly but obeyed, back half wiggling in anticipation. He was an old a hand to this game. Watched the hunter crest the rise, hidden by a vast fallen trunk of rotted bark and clumps of green-grey moss. Approved in that wordless, heedless way an animal would as the cub grown to wolf peeked over his cover and surveyed their quarry of long, patient hours.

A dozen points of curling antler bobbed in the shattered sunlight beneath the forest canopy. Brown fur matted and mossed but still noble. Rickon remembered the Baratheons and that single memory was the pebble before the landslide, shattering and smothering his freedom-

She was in his eyes every bit as much as the stag below him. She came to easily to his mind; easy as the gift he'd been born with, to walk in the skin of Shaggydog. He had to close his eyes and let the shadows blot her out even as she grew larger and more real in the brief darkness. Wash her away and return to that cool, focused place.

Keen as the arrow he raised, taut as the bow it was notched within. The hunter judged distance even as the bowstring creaked minutely next to his ear, cutting into his fingers. One arm straight and pressed by the invisible energies he could not understand but knew intimately, just as she understood perfectly and yet could not hit a target more than a dozen paces away. 

_Enough of her, damnit!_

He bit down again and shrunk his world down to the point of the arrow. The way it wavered the merest fraction in his grip. The stag pacing gently at the end of it, looking so small but touched across a hundred paces by the gleaming tip-

So bright it caught the animal's eye, and that furry head swung round to him with such grace. Rickon had seen deer countless times, and always envied them for such. The stillness they seemed to possess, exploding into speed like grounded lightning in a moment. But the stillness... the quiet... the way its mouth ceased to chew and his black eyes looked into his own. Unsure of what he was. Predator? Rival? Something less? More?

Moment. _The_ moment. All the gruelling, silent slivers of time before it a great mass of drops and drabs, rushing stream towards this one end. 

Rickon's lips did not move, but his soul cast a thought, and his thanks, to the gods he knew still breathed in these places. Old wyrd. Older than words and writing and men, First or Third or otherwise. The ones that watched him now. Mayhap he fancied the air was stilled around them, from fallen trunk to standing statue of antler and hoof and fur, the gods holding their breath tight as if in honor of the moment.

Rickon saw those black and amber eyes meet his own across such a short distance. The arrow would take a mere blink to careen through the close, warm air and pierce the stag's breast. It would die, or it would run... but not very far, once he gave Shaggy his signal and the direwolf had the maddening scent of fleeing, bleedin prey to chase down. Blue eyes as cold as Shaggy's green ones, just as intent, became a single azure orb as he closed one... aimed down the arrow.

Rickon breathed in... and he held it... vision a mite sharper.

Not even the hint of a tremble. Firm. Purposeful.

_As it should be. Hunter and hunted. Predator and preyed upon. The only truth of this life._

His fingers loosened on the string and-

A burst of raucous, rolling noise from a mirthful throat shattered the moment like a hammer through a pane of glass. The stag's head jerked towards it and Rickon's gaze flickered-

Long enough for the agile deer to take to its hooves, great bounding leaps through foliage and bracken, crunching and rustling and snapping the foliage underneath them. Shaggy was a tense, growling hulk next to Rickon, echoing the muttered curse in harsh Skagosi Rickon let loose. The blink that should have been devoted to his killing blow was instead given to watching the stag vanish with a crash and a snort into the undergrowth, sharp blue eyes tracking shuddering movement between leaf and limb until he was gone. But the laughter remained.

The prince of Winterfell cussed further in that language barely removed from the wildling tongue and patted Shaggy on the shout, as if in apology. His ears could hear fresh companions to the rich man's laughter of moments before; more of the same, by the sound of it. Easily half a dozen, over the soft crunch and gentle snort of horses. The creak of a single wagon wheel and...

Rickon frowned. He knew that voice. 

He moved without order to Shaggy nor explanation, but the great beast of his house followed him without either, clawed paws gouging at the dirt and grass as Rickon tore ahead, bow and arrows still gripped tight. At the edge of the treeline he could see placid, oblivious shapes moving through the meadow beyond. But who would travel off the King's Road, by far the safest travel artery in the whole body of Westeros? The Wolf-Prince felt a flush of anger smothering something gentler. 

_They should damn well know better. Even a half-dozen bandits could cause havoc with a party of traders and farmers who haven't held steel since the End Of Night._

But as he got closer, the annoyed frown grew deeper and then smoothed, voice slithering and giggling into his ears like a dove's song. He slid to the nearest tree and peeked through the leaves like a children of the forest, eyes hungry for her, searching the row of ponies and horses and the rough, bearded men riding them, until he found-

A smile he knew from years and nights and days both frustrating and enlightening. Hair tumbling down square shoulders, never quite the profile of a story book maiden, but so full and bouncing with every hoofprint the horse lay on the grass, a happy black mane of curls. 

The eyes were the killers, though, and face swaddled in shadow and lush green, Rickon smiled as he drank them in. Blue like his own, but not the bright azure of a summer sky or a desert lake; darker, somehow stronger. Like the iron of her father had found its home in her gaze and the steel-bolt eyebrows above each were holding it all together. Rickon had seen that girl quail raiders with a glance; even Northern cavalry stammered and remembered their "m'lady's" around her, a girl long-since without any family worthy of titles. 

But not that day. That day she was smiling, grin lighting the meadow like a fireball at midnight and Rickon followed her gaze-

"Shaggy-"

_Shit!_

The direwolf was already tearing across the tall grass, barking and howling like a happy puppy seeing his master again. Rickon's jaw clicked as it dropped and gods above and below and around, was it too much to ask for a little loyalty?! He hiss again but Shaggy had suddenly developed very selective deafness and was focused tight and sharp on the woman and heedless to anything else. The horsemen bubbled in confusion, horses shrieking suddenly as a wolf easily their size came exploding from the woods. Steel shone in the sun. The direwolves were the symbol of House Stark and to be respected, but a wild animal charging you was an animal looking to get put down. Rickon readied himself to-

"Shaggy?! Shaggydog!"

She always made it sound like two words, not just the one that he always did. She shouted in her Learning Lady Voice to the nervous guards and leaped down from her horse, and Rickon couldn't help but smirk. She was a country girl, now. Ten years building up her little solar, living with farmers and merchants and woodsmen and fishers and tanners and men who'd had no trade at all, save the sword. Coming to bed every night with her hands sore and her back aching but always with a smile, by the light of the candles she was so careful to save. 

Shireen slid from her saddle and hit the ground already running. Shaggy was a big soft lump of nothing in hands that were barely big enough to fit around his snout.

"Ooof! Steady, now, boy! Shaggy?! No!"

A mummer's row of stunned, pinched faced watched the little Learning Lady get butted back by the wolf with a wagging tail the size of a broadsword, then put one hand on her hip and point the other one down to the ground. Her voice was hard and her eyes were the same and Rickon could see the progeny of Stannis Baratheon in her then... especially when Shaggy's rump slapped into the grass without even a whine. 

_Daft sod._

"Ooooooh, I've missed you," Shireen buried her face into that back neck and Rickon flushed with absurd, demented jealousy for his furry brother. He watched her hands stroke and slide and caress and felt his throat grow tight. Shaggy was smacking her cheek and hair with his lolling tongue and she laughed. She laughed and Rickon couldn't breath, just for a moment, as if the rustle of his exhale would mar the music from it. Shaggy was several hundred pounds of mistrusting male aggression; even the other direwolves in the North stayed away from him. He was gnarled and scarred a dozen times over. Page boys shuddered when he stalked past with Rickon and septas muttered prayers to the Father to save them from the devil-dog. 

Shireen saw a big puppy and hugged him tight. She could not see the bad in him if he tried and yes, _now_ he was on his back and she was stroking his belly. 

_This is nigh-on embaras-_

"Where's Rick, huh? Where is he?"

Don't you do it, Rickon thought as he heard her question his friend, both of them half-hidden by the long grass, aside from his bobbing black bulk and her crown of curls. She craned her neck up and scanned the treeline, looking but not seeing, and Rickon was tempted to breath deep again and yank on that thread, force him away from her-

_Is that what you'd do? Pad away like Shaggy had just got bored? Or would her hands on "you" stop that from happening?_

"Rick?! You out there?!"

The boy who had suffered at the Dreadfort and beyond, now a man and warrior and prince, rested his back against the tree and struggled for anything approaching the appropriate response. That was getting harder to find. 

She was leaving. She was going away and it would be for years and why not just take his hands or his eyes while she was on her way from the North? It would be much the same to him. He'd paced his rooms and nearly broken himself in the training yards and gods, even tried to immerse himself in affairs of the kingdom any distraction. But they did nothing but draw the pain into sharper relief when he faced it again. Still untouched and without an answer. 

He hated that he'd snapped at his sister. She had not deserved his snarling retort. But Rickon knew he was not a man for soft words, and when he could not find them, he was naught but Shaggy on two feet and with keener claws. 

_Yet another reason you are unfit for her._

"Rick! C'mon, Rick, I know you're out there!"

"Learning Lady, he might be off hunting somewhere else! And you should be careful around-"

"Oh, don't fret, Strabo."

He turned in the shade of the trees and saw her gliding through the grass, Shaggy a black smear lurking at her side like a tame bear. One of her escort had come down to see if she needed aid but she was steaming ahead of him like a galley through calm waters, eyes hungry and searching for him. Rickon slid back to cover and watched. She was not a beauty to many and most; they'd never compare her to Sansa or the Dragon Queen, both of whom had matched cunning and sheer, stubborn grit with a beauty that had made artists shake their heads in defeat.

She was rarely asked to dance, he heard, and Rickon both grieved and hated for that. The thought of her alone, with that smile she knew so well, painted onto her face to cover her hurt, the way everyone ignored her... it made the Wolf-Prince burn and his mood blacken. He looked again and saw the one who had helped him and educated him and saved what shred of a man he was before the Skagosi and the wyrd of his warging could have obliterated that forever. 

Everyone else saw the grey scars on her face. A subpar woman who was too busy reading to whelp like a good bitch, and even if she would, what man would have her? 

Rickon stood by his statement of arrival: people were _fucking stupid_. 

"Rick...?"

Doubt was in her voice. Disbelief, almost, that Shaggy would roam without his constant brother. Rickon saw the disappointment on her face, and yes, that was what it was. She was looking forward to seeing him. Her cheeks glowed and now they were no longer rosy and plump; her smile had died and they were straight and pale again. He gripped his weapon and cursed himself and his stupidity. 

Even when she would never know otherwise, he could not let her down.

"Fucking stupid," he muttered to himself, sounding more like the Northman he was born than the Skagosi he'd become; speaking in his father's tones as he stepped from shadow into sunlight. "Aye, that's about bloody right..."

 

**SHIREEN**

 

"Strabo, I think you're perhaps missing my point."

"Don't think so. Father's entitled to see his daughter find a strong man, and I don't see strength in that one."

"Because he won't kidnap her?"

"It'd sure show his _liking_ , wouldn't it?"

The bearded wilding gave a little smirk at the prospect, and Shireen reminds herself that's because he was  _still_ a wildling. Ten years living south of the Wall, a decade in the Kingdom of the North, that wasn't enough to wipe away the memory of thousands of years living in a wasteland of endless, merciless white. Nor erase the culture that hard place had bred. But Strabo and his Kes were an interesting example for her. He a grizzled former raider, survivor of the Fall, the Night and then the Dawn, born running and hiding from crows and anyone else trying to kill him (and perhaps eat him). 

Kes was born with her father's hair and jaw but most of her life had been lived around Last Heath. Among civilization, as Shireen had been raised to understand it. Stone towns and roads, blacksmiths and dressmakers, farms and castles and all the other trappings of a people who didn't need to constantly move. A keen mind, too, the learning lady remembered, especially when it came to working leather. 

"Aeric seems like a fine young man," she said diplomatically, reasoning that, yes, behind the cleft lip and the stutter he _was_ a good man. "He has simply been raised to ask a maiden's hand before he proposes marriage."

"Propose." Strabo rolled his eyes and shook his head in the manner of despairing older generations the world over. "I don't want his kneeler words-"

"Strabo?"

All it took was the tone; like the point of a needle at your side. Shireen had long-mastered it. The big wildling who would have happily killed a girl marked with the Grey Death years before shuffled a little in his saddle, snorting softly like a sleeping bull. A snake-quick glance at her unimpressed face. Not an ounce of yield, there. 

"... _Northern_ words-"

"Better."

"-but y'still can't trust 'em. But slinging Kes over his shoulder and running for the trees?" A rich, ribald laugh that used to make her jump when she was a girl, a grin that told Shireen the man was remembering his own youth. "Ah, now _that_ tells a father much..."

Shireen gave a sigh and massaged the side of her head. She'd have to talk to Aeric when they got home. Maybe impart some of the more... unorthodox skills that Rickon had taught her, years before. 

Her fingers still worked at her temple but the smile came regardless. Rickon. The only other constant in her life. She'd been a properly scandalized young lady when he'd told her how to put a grown man on his arse with only her hands (or whatever else she had in them), but experience had taught her the value of those unsubtle methods. Year after year the reckless, unfettered boy had grown to man and been squeezed by the birthright he barely recalled. Wolf-Prince. Stark heir.

The smile grew shadowed and sad, hidden by her swaying curls. He did not want it. Many nights she'd seen him brood over a raven's message, calling him to some affair or obligation he did not understand. He was Wolf-Born among the Skagosi; he was happy in that life, harsh as it was. She'd watched him laugh and sing with the Stone Men he'd brought with him from that feared isle. The brotherhood of war and death... gods, how she was tired of it. 

Shireen had seen enough killing for a dozen lives, but Rickon was bred for it, and it frightened her.

_Wars do not last forever. Even the raiders will soon be gone. He needs to find something else, or his hunger will turn on his own soul._

A cold stone dropped into a dark, still pool and Shireen's stomach dropped. Years he had spent hunting down those raiders who would not accept the new peace that kingdoms had died for, because they did not know any better, could not even fathom a life without constant strife. A cunning few had bent the knee and taken the Queen's offers and kind words. Too many had been like Strabo. They understood only the sword.

Rickon had gave it to them, and by the end of the day, she would see him again. 

"Learning Lady? Shireen, you alright?"

The voice came from an ocean away. It seeped through her thoughts like water through stone and Strabo had to reach out and touch her shoulder to bring her back to the meadow. The girl breathed in sharply and managed a quick smile.

"Sorry, just... off somewhere else."

Strabo harumphed and gave her a measured look. "No wonder. Mind like yours..."

Which she had been damn grateful for, considering the company for the journey. The Learning Lady hadn't stopped her lessons just because her solar was a memory in her wake; she still had scrolls and books and students. Whether they liked it or not. A dozen men past their thirtieth year trooped behind her, and in the North, that meant you had survived horror. Shireen remembered when every man who could life a sword or spear had been marched towards the icy monstrosity that crept towards them from unknowable regions. Kingdoms had rallied, and for one shining moment, it seemed to her, all grudges and feuds had been forgotten.

The Others did not care for crowns or thrones or houses. They came for the end of lives. All of them.

"Shireen? You're doing it again?"

"Strabo," she said once her wits returned, "It is 'Shir-een'. Not 'Shear-an'. I do believe we've been over this before?"

"Oh, we have," the wilding said, smile splitting his beard, followed fast by another sly wink. "But it's a good way to make sure you pay attention."

"Such a brazen way to speak to your teacher."

"Yes, because I am so famed for my manners, am I not?"

Now it was Shireen's turn to laugh, and mayhap it came louder and longer than before. The open air always did that to one. No walls or ceilings to throw back your joy and make it seem obtuse. Just the everlasting sky and the patient trees, waving to you, begging you laugh and share it with them. She looked around and was happy again, memories of pitch-flecked swords and obsidian arrows and fields of dead men vanishing.

_That is over. It is the past. Now to the-_

"Fucking gods!"

Her mouth opened to slap a reprimand on Cadzak but before she could a black blur the size of a horse exploded from the treeline. At once the men were to arms, no strangers to ambush. Bows were raised and everywhere was the hiss of swords pulled from scabbards and horses whinnying their fright. But no such sound came from her throat. When the air was filled with terror at the beast, that pocket around her erupted again in laughter.

"Shaggy?! Shaggydog!" 

She slid from her saddle and met him in the grass that tickled and scratched them both, tumbling down with something so huge it could have crushed her or laid her open with an errant twitch. But she couldn't fear around Shaggydog. Everyone else was wary of him, even Strabo and his veterans. Only Sansa and Rickon and Jon smiled and shushed him when he let out growls and barks that shook the rafters. 

Them and her. She saw the wolf and didn't see an animal. She saw the soul that had rescued her, years ago. Saved her friend even though he'd been an inch from death. She plunged her hand into fur so long her arm vanished up to the elbow, giggling as he rolled over and kicked his legs and his tongue lolled and oh, no, she wasn't fooled.

"You're just a big baby, aren't you?" Her voice was a loving coo and Shaggy made some strangled sound that sounded unashamed and approving, as long as she kept scratching him there. "Anything for strokies, hmm?"

But then she was up and her lips were pressed inwards, eyes bright and the joy of moments before was still shining through them. Shaggydog meant Rickon, sure as the sun meant light. She padded through the grass like a nymph of the stories, happy she'd chosen riding breeches and not a dress that would drag and rip over every stray bloody twig. That part of her past, Shireen did not miss. 

She called for him. Not your majesty, or grace, or even his full name. Her smile was in her voice and every moment she expected to see him slide from the trees like, scowl locked in place only to break into a wry grin at her. Rick seemed to save that look just for her: when his lips curled up at one side, head shaking a touch, smile halfway between him deciding whether to mock her or-

_Well... he most certainly wouldn't do **that**. _

But he did not appear. The horses snuffled and Shaggy was padding at her side but there was no prince in the meadow. By stubborn increments, the smile died on her face. Oh. She'd been mistaken. Well, that was... not unheard of. Probably just let Shaggydog run out for a while, too long cooped up in the walls of Winterfell. She'd see him soon anyway, so it didn't matter. Not at all.

There was a low whine next to her and Shaggy was a bristly tongue lapping at her hand like he could make it better. She looked down and smiled, seeing her disappointment gazing back up at her in his eyes, one bright as a blazing emerald, the other dull and milky. Both alive enough to convey an beast concerned, head cocked to one side and watching her, tail wagging like a hound.

Shireen let out a small sigh and gave him a scratch behind the ear. Gloom dispelled with the immediacy that only dogs possessed, Shaggy was on her again, giving her bristly kisses up her hand until she forced him away with a laugh.

"Hush, damn you," she said, finding some kind of voice amidst her laughter, and lavishing yet more attention on the seductive old cur. "I'm fine! Where is he, anyway? Oh, I know you can't-"

"He's right here, princess."

For just a moment, she was sure Shaggy had grown a voice. She stared at him and some insane corner of her mind wondered if she could teach him anything. He was an old wolf, after all, and didn't wolves age fast? Or was that dogs? Then the rest of her brain kicked into gear and pulled her head back around towards the trees where the voice had _actually_ come from.

And Rickon was... very much there.

She managed to keep the frog in her throat down to a low ribbit when she swallowed it, which was an improvement. But she could not take her eyes off him. She was suddenly grateful there were no other women traveling with them, for she would have either flushed crimson or shot them poisoned looks to hear them titter and Mother Above when did she start thinking like _that_? 

_Since he grew up. And you started noticing that._

Shireen had met Rickon when he'd been a boy. Curly-haired and chubby-cheeked but aged horribly in his eyes. So much of his innocence gouged and ripped away. Empty sockets for so long, pained and unwilling to feel again. To feel meant to hurt, and they had hurt him so badly, in places that were beyond a healer's hands. He couldn't face it again, but time had stretched and filled him, made him strong as he'd hurtled from one calamity to another.

To an island of savages he'd rallied into an army. To another island of salt and stone and frozen fires. She blinked and the memory had been there. The lady and the blade, and then it was gone, and-

Rickon was there, standing in front of her, and no-one would ever confuse him for being a "mere boy".

"I... ahem, I have-"

_Damnit, woman, if you mumble and stumble you will look the fool! He's just a man!_

"Told me not to call you 'princess' before?" He shrugged and looked off behind her. She stole the chance in an instant, flicking a greedy glance up and down his bare torso and gorging herself 'til her stomach heated like a hearth took to fire. "Yes, I remember. Ask me if I care."

_No. No "just" about-_

"Princess? We all there today?"

"I asked the same thing earlier."

"... hmm?"

"And lo, the maiden find her tongue," he said, and her blush only fed the grin sliding across his face, all feral charm and improper amusement. "Back to join us?"

" _Prince_ Rickon," Shireen said, acutely aware and oddly grateful for Strabo joining them, though Shaggy gave him a low growl as a matter of course. "I see your customary flippancy has not been diminished by the hunt."

"Do you revel in using long words or something?"

"Only with those whom I know cannot follow them."

"You taught me well, _princess_."

"Not everything, though, _Lord_ Stark."

His eyes pinched at the corners a touch, shield broken in their little joust. Lord _Anything_ was always a good blow to launch against the warrior, such was his disdain for his heritage. Some eel of disquiet warned her not to press so on a boy who barely remembered his parents, but she just crossed her arms under her chest and waited for his return, Shaggy between them, casting mossy eyes back and forth between them. Even Strabo seemed to be enjoying the show. 

"Why are you not on the Kingsroad?"

"This way is faster."

"And less safe."

"On the contrary. You have seen to that."

"To some, not to all, and you should not risk yourself."

Fire and steel crept into his voice but Shireen was not expecting that so soon. He almost seemed angry, muscled in his arms coiled and tensed as he aped her stance, bow slung over his shoulder and across his chest. She managed to drag her eyes off the thickness of his skin (hard enough, given how much was on display) and look into his eyes for the truth... and yes... he was angry. His nostrils flared and his lips were pursed and he looked ready to flog a man for dereliction of duty. 

Well. She was not a bloody _man_. 

"I know that having a ward of House Stark come to harm would reflect badly on you, but-"

"Gods, is _that_ where you think my concern springs from? _Gossip_ about-"

"But..." she repeated, biting off the word and noted Strabo studying his boots for a busy moment. Probably hiding a grin, and she knew why. Rickon Wolf-Born Stark, feared and respected from the Ruins to the Neck and beyond, snapped his mouth shut with a click of his teeth and breathed in deep and stymied.

_Well, too bad. Let him pout. Serves him right for interrupting._

"I know what raiders remain would not dare strike so close to Winterfell. They are broken and scattered, thanks to you. Besides, I have ample protection, so where is the need for that dark look-" 

She paused. Just for a moment. Warring voices in her head cheering her forward and pulling her back and to _hells_ with it-

"-sweet prince?"

Now it was his turn to flush, and Shireen celebrated with a smug little smile. He glanced away, defeated and seemed unsure of himself. Their wars of words were regular conflicts, always ending in truce or tactical withdrawal, but never fully resolved. She would miss them, and in that thought all of what she would miss came back to her. Hair that fell to his shoulders like he was Shaggy's real brother, wild and thick and hardly ever combed. The way he looked back at her sharply and she could see fierce, raw power in them, bent on salvaging something from his loss. That was what made Rickon among her best at the solar, she decided. Not his mind, which was fine but not crafted to learning, but his will. His passion. 

_Passion. As if I will ever know that._

"I would not see you come to harm."

Shireen blinked. It wasn't often Rickon let any softness creep into his voice, at least not in such a low fashion. But his voice was hushed and his tone in earnest, a gruff man's means of pleading, she noticed. Not begging or pleading, just growling displeasure that he did not want to see again. The eyes lied, though. Just the thought of her harmed and the armor in those eyes cracked just a touch.

_Dark blue. Like a lake at dawn. Not bright, not yet. If only he'd frown less, everyone would see that._

"So from now on," he said abruptly, turning on his heel and barking the words over his shoulder. "Take the fucking Kingsroad!"

"Rickon?!"

"Oh, don't give me a lecture on language, we're not in your solar. Shaggy?! Come here, you treacherous old bastard!"

"Shaggy, stay!"

He whirled on her like a hawk to a pigeon and damned if she'd so much as blink she he did. Shaggy was between them and looked even more torn than ever, until he sunk down to the grass, chin on his front paws, wanting to be somewhere else. Rickon's mouth was open just a fraction and he gazed in disbelief as the direwolf - _his_ damn direwolf - gave heed to her over him. Shireen didn't even know if it would work. She just used the tones she'd crafted for rowdy men of several species. Still, they were similar in one respect: show them a female with some steel in a spine, and they all became boys again. Or pups.

"That was unnecessary, Rickon."

"You expect an apology?"

"I don't deserve one?"

"No, I don't think you do."

Embarrassment and girlish hesitation was drowned in a moment. She was her father's daughter, flawed and wrong as King Stannis had been. She would not suffer impudence from some boorish boy, even if it was Rickon bloody Stark. But what was her recourse? Harsh words? Now, that was his game, and he would delight in so corrupting her-

_Gods, don't think of it that way._

-so what did that leave? Tears? Sooner she would die than give him that pleasure, or abuse her womanhood so. Her mind turned over the conundrum as Rickon's smirk returned, every inch the barbarian prince, half-naked and caring not a jot for his skin and form on display for a lady. The sight of it alone was enough to derail her but then Shaggy whined again and she grinned instead.

"Fine. Then Shaggy will go with me to Winterfell."

"I... What did-"

"Have you missed me?" Ignoring _royalty_ completely, Shireen crouched down and bore up Shaggy's snout in her hands, nuzzling his cold nose until he licked her ecstatically, tail scything down grass in delight. "Awwwwww, I know you have, my prince. Want to trot with me back home? Hmm? What do you say?" A bark that sent her pony skittering was his answer, and she got back to her feet. "There. Decided. You can walk back by yourself."

"You can't-"

"Yes, I can, if you insist on playing the braggart with me, sweet prince." She kept her tone honeyed and aloof, knowing what armor that gave a woman. Spit and snarl and you only goaded an attack; maintain your dignity and every man became a little boy again, afraid of insulting and angering the lady. Rickon was no difference, stuttering anger jittering around his mouth but never quite giving him voice. "Unless you'd care to apologize...?"

Dawn lakes became black slits for a dangerous moment. "You know I could _make_ him."

Shireen's own did not recoil. She had seen Rickon's wyrd, and did not fear it. In that moment, quite the opposite. "And if that is how you wish to treat your little brother, so be it, but I'll not think of you the same way after."

Something widened his eyes and Shireen knew fear when she saw it, even if was but for an instant. She frowned, unsure what it meant but before she could enquire further-

"Fine. I'm sorry for cursing."

"Rickon, I am sure my teaching would have given you a grander vocabulary," she said, relishing every dram of her victory, taking a brave step forward. "Try again."

"You're enjoying this, aren't you?"

"Oh, you have no idea."

"Lady Shireen of House Baratheon," Rickon said through clenched teeth, flashing a quick "you're going to pay for this" look at Shaggy as he did. "I extend my apologies for my language and beg your forgiveness for my tra-gression."

"'Tra _ns_ gression', Rick."

"Oh, gods, woman, _whichever_ , am I forgiven or not?!"

"I've heard better, but..." Just a quicky shrug of her shoulders, like a woman bartering over fish at the market. "I suppose it will do. Off you go, Shaggy."

Off he did with a low huff at his master, who was hardly impressed with her... and she did not care. The sun was bright and cast its warmth now the Winter was gone and Summer was making them all sweat, even in the chilly North. It meant she lost none of him to shadow, and that was fine by her. He was chastened and Shireen had to admit, she liked him that way. Always he was this prowling, powerful thing around her, untameable and damn-well aware of it. Any moment of victory she could get, and in such a fine setting, she would enjoy.

She giggled. She couldn't help it. She didn't often get the chance to just be a young lady, always engaged with this family or that dispute or some-such lesson. Even if it was with one who couldn't be hers, she decided to enjoy it.

"He wouldn't have gone with you, y'know," Rickon said, sulk in his voice lending a touch of doubt to his words. "He would have followed me."

"I'm sure," she said, meaning the opposite and his scowl told her just that. "Hunting, I take it?"

He patted the bow and arrows. "What makes you say that?"

"Rickon...?"

"Fine, fine, yes, hunting. You and your escort scared the stag, though. That belch you call laughter was _you_ , Strabo?"

"How well you know me, Wolf Prince."

He grinned and it spread from his lips to his cheeks to his eyes and seemed to make him swagger without even moving. Northerners always shied away from that infamous name their young prince bore, but the wildlings embraced it. What man _wouldn't_ want to be known by such a fierce title, after all? They couldn't understand why it would be "unseemly" or "improper". Rickon, though... he was as much a wildling as some of them, in many ways. 

Again she felt a sadness swell for the prince. Things should have been different for him.

_Life is not a song. Just like Sandor says._

"Will you try again?"

"I might," he said with a careless shrug, eyes already looking beyond her as if he could spy a stag through curtains of trees. "But Winterfell seems more likely."

"Would you ride with us?"

Woman, be careful-

"No, we prefer the woods, Shaggy and me," he said, and he was turning, he was leaving, he was walking away from her but _she_ was the one doing that! Barely a handful of days and she would never see him strut from her again like the gods had fashioned him from marble and oak and breathed him into the meadow. "So, we'll see you there, princess."

Shireen watched him go and her voice caught. Years of nights biting her tongue and letting the moment slide, telling herself it was for the best, because better to not know defeat than be humiliated by confession. Now she had no time to indulge that. Rickon was growing smaller, slashes of black shadow whipping his back from the trees beginning to loom over him and-

"Then I'll come with you!"

"Shireen, I-"

She left Strabo behind in a softly-cursing mess and walked next to Rickon, whose neck probably couldn't handle any more sudden jerks around. Shaggy made a curious querying sound in the back of his throat and Shireen petted him quickly, putting him at ease. Herself, also. A brush of warm, soft fur against her hand before she looked up into Rickon's eyes and tilted her chin, challenge and statement all at once.

"I'm sure you know your way home."

"We've no food or shelter, Shear-"

"Gods, I just told _Strabo_ about that-"

"-and I take a fast pace."

"While hunting?"

"While going back to the castle."

_He doesn't want you to come. He wants you to stay with the men, stay away from him, ignore you until-_

Shireen inhaled and blew away that voice. No more time. No more space to plot and lie to herself that one day, one day she would tell him. The hourglass was nearly empty and she couldn't turn it back over. A handful of sand, of days, then she would not be coming back for years. His eyes loomed above her like twin moons over some strange planet, and when his face crinkled as it did, she didn't feel the scars on her face.

"Well, then," she said, flexing her toes in her riding boots and peering past him a touch, getting some idea of the terrain in that warren of shrubs and black bark. "A good thing I dressed for the ride, not the ball, hmm? Lead on."

He studied her longer and finally-

A tug at one corner.

A sparkle that had nothing to do with the sun in his eyes and more to do with the fire somewhere else. 

A little sigh and a shake of his head and his voice talking loud over her head.

"Strabo? Tell my sister I will escort the Lady Shireen to Winterfell."

"Through the Wolfswood?"

"I am sure she will be delighted."

Strabo's face was a stoic lie to his next words: "As I will be to inform her."

"Good man." Already he was walking, some lost god to her eyes with burnished skin and soot-blackened knives and bare feet. She looked back up and he was in the trees, half in shadow and half in the sun, the latter catching his face one last time as he jerked his head into the leaf-roofed gloom. "Coming?"

Shireen strode with rubber in her feet, frowned low and serious before taking his lead. "Only to keep Shaggy happy."

"Bloody typical..."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hehe... great timing, Lady+Rain. ;-)


	40. Chapter 40

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow. Three months. "Ashamed" doesn't even begin to cover it, but anyway, here it is. 
> 
> Thanks to the certain few who never gave up on me. :-)

**LORD WYMAN**  

Walls were raised and roofs were thatched. Shells of dwellings and blood-stinking halls were filled with industry and swept of the Stranger's touch. From his window and his balcony Lord Wyman watched Winterfell shed its skin of betrayal and horror like a snake, reborn with the wolf sigil flying over the Great Hall, the Flayed Man's banner and all its smaller offspring burnt the very day of their victory. 

 _That is what it was_ , he reminded himself. _The North routed the Boltons here. Only the Dreadfort is left and then their stain will be erased forever. A Stark rules Winterfell again. Mayhap her brother will return and we shall see a King again with Ned's eyes and honor._

_This was a victory. This was what you planned and struggled and lied and debased yourself for._

The words echoed in his mind but when he looked upon the stones on his son's eyes, they were nothing. They bought nothing. They meant nothing. Trembling fingers caressed a cheek hard and blue and the Lord of White Harbor wished it was his bloated corpse on the slab. That was how it should be: sons bury fathers. The old die and the young live to carry the fire of life instead.

"Not this. Never this."

Behind him, the rote suck and sigh of his shields' breathing paused for a moment. He imagined flickering glances, eyes briefly choked with concern, worry... doubt? Well, would that be so unbelievable? He had ever been their liege, both rolicking Lamprey and plotting Lord. Rufus and Eric had long been in his confidences, and now they could see as well as he the fruits of all his machinations.

His son on a bed of stone, never to wake. Another in his family crypt, face destroyed by a crossbow bolt. His future, their future... gone. All to satisfy his-

"Enough," he rasped, and his shoulders bunched as if he were ready to deliver a blow. His head bowed, crushing the pain in his stomach and the whispers in his skull. "Enough of this."

The door behind him opened, and the future walked in with an air of distinct anxiety.

"L-Lord Wyman?"

The great man (in both stature and girth) turned to see a boy in the garb of a hardened soldier. Leather armor studded with iron, pitted and scratched but thoroughly scrubbed. A sword at his side with a fine handle that caught his eye. A face grown sallow in the cheeks by witness of butchery, mastery of hunger. Ah, he knew it well... but he had to issue a small smile as a familiar prickly worry, doubled over and then again when the boy saw what Wyman had been brooding over-

"My-My lord, I-I am sorry, I had no idea-"

"You knew only that I had summoned you," Wyman said in a voice barely a shadow of what it had been. This carter turned warrior would have to strain his blushing ears to hear every syllable. "Not where I was, nor what I was engaged in. No need to apologize... Niall, yes?"

"Y-Yes, my lord."

"You're quite the hero, so they tell me. From my own lands, no less. The Hero of Winterfell, mere nights before, bustling a cart around White Harbor. Someone will make a song, no doubt."

"And of the others, my lord. There seem to be quite a few heroes of Winterfell."

His brown eyes flickered to the corpse for but a moment, then back to Wyman. They did not waver. Lord Lamprey studied him as his gross chest rose and fell like a planet growing and shrinking. Was he seeking favor? Many would, if they'd grasped some scrap of glory from such a battle, and seek to wring it into something more. But flowery words would be the usual way; not the subtle glance he had just seen. 

"You mean my son?"

"An-And others, my lord."

Fire sprouted in the father's eyes, and steel sprang into his voice. "Oh? More deserving than my Wylis, hmm?"

"That was not what I said."

"And that is not an answer."

The boy was trying to hard to be brave. Wyman felt a finger of shame caress his choler, bid the fire back to embers. He was a lowborn, a smallfolk, thrown into the meatgrinder like thousands of others, and now his lord was tying him up in words. He tried to feel more guilt, but that was his son next to him, his youngest boy, who had endured so much and tried so hard and how had the gods rewarded his courage? Quarrels in his chest. 

"I apologize if I give offence," Niall said, choosing his words as an archer would distant targets, but he did not lower his gaze. Wyman felt his lip twitch under his beard. Fire and grit, that one. "Your son fought bravely by the river when we smashed the Freys. He led the charge with Stannis across the drawbridge. It was... bad luck, my lord. Crossbows killed many men on that bridge. Highborn and low."

"The gods saw fit to take my son, you mean?"

"I didn't see any gods on the bridge, my lord," came the retort as fast as a counter-riposte. Memories swam in those unwavering eyes, bloody and bellowing. "Save maybe the Stranger."

More silence. More muted fidgeting and slow staring. Wyman turned back to his son and patted his hand, icy and stiff and inhuman. He would not do this to himself again. Spend hours gazing and standing vigil over a length of meat. His son was gone, and he prayed he was at peace. Anymore than that...

"Lord... heh, excuse me, _King_ Stannis tells me that you and that southron Clegane were instrumental in taking Winterfell. Secret tunnels, daring midnight infiltrations, appearing like daemons from the crypt to seize the gatehouses. Very impressive. Worthy of reward, wouldn't you say?"

"Well, since _I'm_ the one to be rewarded, my lord..."

Wyman laughed, or at least tried. It was a wheezing, rasping thing that ended in a scraping cough like a horse, but the mirth was there, dancing in old eyes. 

"Ver-Very good, boy. A healthy self-interest is no bad thing."

"I heard," the words started but then halted, confusion clouding the boy's face until he was sure his lord wouldn't have his castrated for talking without his say so. Or whatever the lowborns assumed men like him did to those who displeased them. Wyman was somewhat proud of the fact that it took a lot to move him to savagery. Order and justice were important to a realm; vengeance was something else. "I heard... I was told, I mean, that I was to be raised to the Northern cavalry."

"Indeed. Would you take such an honor?"

"I don't know, my lord."

Wyman blinked. He blinked some more. He'd known highborn scions and sellswords jump at the chance for such a position, though it hardly came with the "ser" and oils and finery that the southrons seemed the slather on their mounted soldiers. It was rank and privilege, which always came with gold and, frankly, the benefit of being able to shit on those lower than you. Wyman knew well the ambition of men: how dangerous, how corrupting, and how motivating it could be. 

_But a carter, likely the son of carters, is unsure? Curious._

"Not quite the answer I was expecting."

"I don't know how to fight from a horse, my lord. Haven't ridden them often, either."

"You will be _taught_ , of course. They don't just throw armor and a lance at you and be done with it."

"My lord, that's not-"

"I _know_ what you meant, boy."

With his words he advanced and Lord Lamprey should have seen his shields' eyes then. Blank masks they ever were, iron barriers as their titles suggested, but something moved across their stares as they watched their lord step closer to this brave young fool. Purpose seeped back into his eyes, his stride, his very bearing. Here was a problem that needed correcting. A mind in a quandary, and their lord saw both opportunity and duty in the form of Niall. He stopped in front of him and gave a lopsided smile that stretched his beard up one side of his face.

"You're not sure if you're man enough. Is that it?"

"I... My lord... No. I'm not."

His lips puckered into a brief pout and a curious sound hummed from his throat. "Then you'd best find out. There's much to be risked, I'll not deny you. First into battle. Braving arrows and quarrels and spears. Training isn't exactly a night with a maiden, either, believe me. But you will have some rank and some purpose, boy. Or you can leave this place with a bag of gold for a job well done, have a song or two sung in your honor-"

He leaned closer and all tones jovial and fatherly were snatched from his voice in a twinkling. Something close to contempt was there instead. But not quite.

"-then you can slink back to White Harbor and cart around cow shit and potatoes and hidden wine like a man too weak to grasp something better."

Every twitch and tightening told him his words caught sparks on the boy. Confusion melted away to indignation, awkward cow eyes hardened to steel. Wyman watched, he observed, holding his breath and his hope. The faint crack of knuckles grasped tight into a fist nearly made him smile. Oh, a fire in this one. Staring down his lord with his shields flanking him, no less.

The boy's mouth tugged up at one corner, and there was a man's resolve there. Wyman lifted his chin and awaited the answer he already knew was coming.

"Didn't wade through all that blood to go back to cow shit."

"Horse shit it is, then?"

"Won't I have a squire for that?"

He laid his hand on the boy's shoulder, and saw his son's eyes for but a flash, staring back at him, bent on a hard future, but one worth the pain. His lips twitched and he forgot the agony in his throat. The wheezing in his lungs that only grew heavier fled from him and his chest swelled, joints free from ache. Hammers clanged and thudded beyond the window; men yelled and cursed and laughed. Wyman glanced out the higher window and heard the songs of birds and restoration beyond them. Looked back at the boy on his path and eager to start it. 

_If only to show this fat old lord that he can._

"All in good time. You'll probably have a wife before a squire, lad. You're quite the catch, the servants tell me." A crack in his resolve; just enough for the lord to see some flitting thing beyond it, slippery and without name but removed from martial works. And that alone told him much. "Ah. Already cast your eye on one, have you?"

Niall smiled, but it was not like before it. It spoke of loss, the kind a man felt when he'd not even possessed to begin with. His mind whirred with all the devious skill and speed that had danced around the Leech Lord and his monstrous bastard, found an answer but decided not to speak it. The boy did not need to be reminded.

"I can cast all I like, milord. Doesn't mean I'll get-"

Horns crashed through the air, great gusting booms that stilled the hammers and voices and sent birds cawing and fluttering away. Wyman's head jerked to the window as harsh words were shouted by harsh men, clanking in readied armor, rattling off orders and soon he knew hooves and carts and the trembling footfalls of thousands would join them. A call to arms, not just of a house but of a kingdom.

Which could only come from one place, and for one purpose.

"My lord, what-"

"He's assembling the men," Wyman said, already striding to the open door, Rufus yanking it open and Eric sliding out into the hallway before his master. Already the echoes of hobnailed boots were pounding through the still-stained stones. "All of them." 

  

**KING STANNIS**

He hated the waiting. Pointless inactivity. Nothing to do but brood and let the mind lead him on paths pointless and doubtful. Winterfell was taken and it would take the army he had to rebuild it, so there was that, and all the minutiae that entailed, but still? The King's eyes were ever drawn the grey east, clouds thick and tall as mountains blotting the sky but never a swooping, gliding figure to spur his feet and mind and heart again. 

Days spent wallowing in endless nothing. No Davos to distract him with his peculiarities and insights. Not his daughter, freed from her prison in all but name, gazing at the world agog and her father, yes, even that man of stone and iron, felt his guts twist to see his child with sun on her face and questions posed to strangers. His wife was rarely in his thoughts, just a flitting concern like a gnat that didn't know when to give up, but the other woman? She was there. With flaming hair and burning eyes and words that did much the same. Scorched through ice and grinding teeth and doubts and looked at him as if he were a-

_No. Not a god. A prophet._

Whatever he was in those red depths, Stannis knew her talents were real and her results undeniable. And she would have calmed him. Known the words better than Selyse with her slobbering fanaticism ever would, dispel his doubts and keep his hand from playing across his face, feeling wrinkles and lines there faster and thicker by the day it seemed. Age eating him alive. Mayhap taking the years from him he took from Renly? 

_Pointless paths. All the-_

Then the maester shuffled into the solar he'd taken for his own, and before the old turtle had spouted the words he knew what they would be. His nose wrinkled at the brine and salt, the smell of the sea he'd not savored since Dragonstone, and his eyes snapped down to the source of it.

A weary raven in the maester's arms, blinking at him with that polished black eyes, too tired to even struggle in the grip of an old man.

"Y-Your majesty, you have-"

"Give it to me."

He devoured the message a dozen times before he spoke again, eyes sliding back and forth across the crinkled parchment, absorbing it, almost to assure himself it was real. But it was. His bannerman had even ended in the same misspelling they'd decided would be their code to each other, that it was indeed he sending word forth that-

"Guard?" A sharp bark was all it took to have the knight guarding his door step inside. "Find Lord Florent. Tell him to sound assembly at once."

"Assemble who, your grace?"

Mayhap the most implacable contender for the Iron Throne marched towards him, and the boy leaner, harder and taller than he nearly tripped out of his way as if Stannis Baratheon were a battering ram. 

"The lords. All of them. Mountain clans, Umbers, Manderly, Glover, Cerwyn, Mormont," he paused as he got to the door, lips tightened in silent, smoldering reproach. "And Lady Sansa. Of course."

"Your grace, what reason should-"

"We are leaving, Ser Willum," Stannis shot over his shoulder, shields falling in behind him, message fluttering at his hip like a flag of triumph, light in his eyes to warm the Red Woman's heart. "And about time of it, too."

 

**THE HILL KNIGHT**

He had seen much death, and in the seeing had grown accustomed to it, in his way.

The bitter gutter scraps of Flea Bottom that ended in blood, they were a tourney duel compared to Harrenhal, and the Riverlands. The trail of gleeful horrors Vargo Hoat and The Mountain had left. Everywhere he had turned, corpses waited for him. They had kept to the woods and left what seemed like a wasteland behind, a ragged column of broken men and refugees, all they could carry on their backs or in their hands. They had skirted the choking swamp of the Neck, avoiding the Kingsroad, for what king would not want their heads on pikes?

The boy... no... no, he was not longer that. Not since he'd felt that rat scrambling around under a bucket on his belly, and if not then, certainly not after he'd felt the meaty, sickening crunch of Biter's neck break under a spear he held. His blue eyes were glazed now, inured and guarded. They stared at the horizon like orbs of blue flint, neither hopeful nor fearful. Around him were his brothers, and the wiry little men who'd found them at the edge of the Neck. The bearded crannogman who'd knelt before their Lady with tears in his eyes, though she'd just stared and stared at Howland Reed as if he were a mad stranger. 

"Lady Stark," he'd croaked, and dared to glance up at the "glory" of the Red God. "What has befallen you?"

He didn't hear what was said, of course. Knight without ointment or a proper armor or even a steed, he'd stayed with the others and the prisoners in shackles, waiting for what was to follow. The Lannister was one-handed again, his golden limb taken quick and sure by men who saw not finery but a month of bread. He watched the woman and hated and pitied her. Saw himself in the way she stayed ever-close to him, hardly speaking except to extol him gently to his feet, iron clanking around them. The others sneered and growled and japed that a lion pelt at Winterfell was what Stoneheart wanted, but Thoros was as implacable as ever.

"The Red God has his plan for the Lannister, and the Lady of Tarth."

Gendry had snorted, but softly. Beric and Thoros had knighted him; Thoros had convinced him to join their Brotherhood, even as it fell to simple butchery of Freys and Lannisters and "collaborators". Fell to smite all the cloaked Lady commanded in tones that scraped like rocks in her throat, vomited up through the slit that would never fully heal. So Gendry kept his scorn to himself and didn't think of the plans of the gods, any of them. 

"Far away, are we, lad?"

He blinked and the wind from the battlements lashed his face, waking him from his reverie as sure as the black-toothed grin a few feet away. Mudge, they called him. Should have been "smudge", going by the beard that was never quite clean, but what he lacked in cleanliness he made up for in grit. The stocky outlaw had been with the brotherhood since Gendry had joined them, and that was no mean feat in a world bent on killing them all. He spat a brown stream over the battlements and watched it hurtle down and down into the brackish waters. Not quite mud, but not solid, endless, sucking fields of it for miles. 

He'd rather stare at them than what was within, though. Gendry had seen much death, but the Stranger was endlessly creative. The Boltons who'd manned the stones he stood on were mute testament to that. 

"Getting away from the smell."

"Aye, fair ripe, aren't they? Must've been the filth the bog devil's fed 'em."

Water gurgled and spluttered from the well, but no man drew from it. None even went near it. That was the Boltons' mistake. High walls and thick gates Moat Cailin had, but they had to drink from somewhere. The crannogmen knew that. More importantly, they knew where the water came from.

Gendry had watched them pour green slime into the steam winding under the castle. Seen it as a slick smear at first, then spread and get lost under the ripples, but do its work all the same. Choke the life from it and replace it with something venomous. 

For a night and two days, men screamed and cursed the gods and the bog devils and then cried and wept for the pain to end. Through meals and watch duty and sleep. By sunset on the second day, there was silence and Howland Reed had stood and nodded. 

"It is done."

Moat Cailin was a tomb when they clambered over the walls. The whole time he'd mounted the wooden ranks, Gendry feared cold eyes and indifferent steel would pop up from above him and strike him from the air, send him down to die in the bogs. But he'd gone all the way up, over the stone teeth of the battlements, and found.

Corpses. This was no strange thing. But bloated and with black tongues clenched between their teeth, veins green and fat on their necks. Face after face, eye after eye filled with agony that was stamped on their sight. Even the flies would not go near them; not yet, anyway. They'd opened the gates and the rest came through, conquerors of the Cailin, to no fanfare nor glory, just a heap of poisoned bodies. 

"When're we moving on?"

Mudge nodded at the clutch of figures in the courtyard. Stoneheart. Reed. Thoros. All talking and planning and, as usual, Gendry was nothing more than a watcher. He huffed like a horse and left Mudge where he was, moving off the battlements and down into the ruins of the Moat. Whatever the Boltons had been doing there, upkeep of the castle proper had not been part of it. Gaping holes pitted roofs and he could smell the rotting food from outside. A huddle of smallfolk that had steered clear of the water skittered here and there, but even he got the same fearful looks from them. 

_For all they know, I could have been tipping poison into the water my own self. Why wouldn't they fear me?_

The forge was the worst of it, at least for him. The embers were nothing but cold coal and piled ash. The bellows were dusty and the tools strewn around without care, without order. Before he was even aware of it, the smithy was putting things to rights, gathering up hammers and tongs and files, blowing and wiping away grime. He ran his hands over the anvil and looked to the ranks of swords that had never been swung; a barrel of horse shoes covered in cobwebs.

"No way for a forge to be."

 "I'm inclined to agree."

He whirled and found Thoros in the doorway, wineskin in his hand as ready as the smile on his face. The pudgy priest made a show of looking around and tutted, subtle as a mummer. 

"Well, it's not the smithy at the Inn, is it?"

"Could be," Gendry said, weighing a hammer in his hand and smiling at the heavy, familiar feeling. Most people saw a hammer and thought of things being battered, broken, smashed to pieces. He saw one and found a tool to make anything, given the time and the tools. "Bloody shame, letting all this go to waste."

"Those?" Thoros pointed at the ironwork scattered around, and then at the man with the hammer. "Or that?"

"You mean me?"

"I suppose."

Gendry's lips pressed into a line and he put down the hammer, but carefully. Just because something was big and blunt didn't mean you could treat it badly. He walked to the door and Thoros was still there, studying him in a manner that made him feel ants crawl on the back for his neck.

"Thought you needed more wine in you before you started playing games?"

"I never play games, Ser Gendry."

"I'm no bloody 'ser' and you know it. Just a bastard boy with a sword and nowhere to go."

"That'll change soon."

"Winterfell?"

"Aye, lad. Winterfell. Lord Reed says the Boltons have been routed and Lord Roose is dead. The Stark girl has taken back her home with King S-"

Like a fool, he let hope flare in him, bright and hot as a star crashed to earth. The surly man fell to the boy again, and he couldn't keep the speed from his words, cutting into Thoros' own without care.

"Arya? She found her way back?"

It lasted as long as it took for the smile to fade on Thoros face. Sympathy. Pity. For something so plain and obvious Gendry might as well have had it stamped across his head and gods, he hated himself for that lone. The Red priest shook his head, words softer, measured for disappointment.

"Her sister, Sansa. We found a message in the maester's tower, with the ravens. Ink still wet. Ordering the garrison here to surrender or leave, for their lord was dead and no help was coming."

"Would they have?"

"Ah. You mean, "could we have just let them go?""

"Can you just answer the question?"

"Let them go to where? The Dreadfort, to bolster Roose's bastard? Or into the countryside, to pillage and rape and burn until they were ended? We could have, yes. But best for all if we didn't, I think."

Gendry tried to move around him, and stepped on something plump and soft. He looked down, and a black hand that should have been stiff oozed under his boot. The blacksmith. Probably some smallfolk who didn't care if it was Ironborn or Bolton or Stark or whoever, as long as he was let be to ply his trade. Just took a drink when the forge had him sweating out his skin, and what was he now?

He swallowed hard and looked into eyes still pleading. Blue eyes. Ringed with red veins like branches piercing the colored middle. He closed his own. Fought away the disgust and the bile in his throat. Until blue turned to grey. Eyes like Summer moons, that chased him when he slept and were still there for those first few beats of waking life in the morning. Their memory was all it took; to slow his heart and quell his roiling innards. Until he could breath deep and step away and around and into the open air again.

"War is nones harvest but The Stranger's, they say," Thoros drew deep from his skin and passed it to him. "After all my years here, I'd be inclined to agree."

He had the look of a man with more to say, and Gendry knew well he was one to wax lyrical until his words bored you into slumber, but it was not to be that day. One of the brothers bounded from the tower entrance and pelted across the yard, skidding at Thoros' feet with a message clutched in his hand. Stony observation then shock then confusion cracked the man's features, and the last worried Gendry most of all. When a man as confident as Thoros of Myr looked unsure, you knew that things were-

"It can't be," he said, voice hollow, head shaking. "We're... It's too far north. Why would she, or he-"

His words cut off. Gendry sighed and rolled his shoulders. Always the last to bloody well know. He should just get used to it. Thoros marched off to his Lady, pale as limestone and about as kindly into the bargain. Gendry caught sight of her coal-colored eyes and couldn't see a shred of Arya in them. As if the grey of the girl he'd known had been polluted and burned into a cinder, without even the thought of hope left in them. The Lady Stoneheart read the message, then passed it to Howland Reed. The little man with a billy goat's beard snorted behind his whiskers and nodded.

"My men will garrison this place. My lady, you need return to your home. If White Harbor sends word to us here, they will surely do the same for Winterfell. King Stannis may already be moving to meet this force."

"Force?"

One word and the eyes of the powerful were fixed on him. Gendry did his best not to squirm or shuffle, but few stood a chance at that with Lady Stoneheart beating down at them with her cadaver's face. She reached up to her throat, covering the gash there that bore no maggots or stitching, wide and grinning a it had been when Black Walder had cut it open. She pressed the hole shut and Gendry grit his teeth as her voice rasped and oozed from her lips.

"A host... of ships... from the... east... Ser Gendry." No, he was not about to tell _her_ he was no ser. "All... kinds. All... sailing... up the... coast."

"Who is it?"

Thoros and Stoneheart and Reed exchanged glances, but no words. They didn't know; Gendry could see it. All they had were fears and suspicions. The boy breathed in and nodded, as if to himself. One thing was pretty clear, as everything was when it came to the North. 

"We know they'll be making for Winterfell."

"Aye, seems likely," said Howland Reed, stroking his beard and staring into nothing. "But White Harbor would give them the clear road to the seat of the North. They sailed past it, further North. The Wall, maybe?"

"This... changes... nothing."

Gasped though they were, the words of the lady that had died Catelyn Stark still commanded silence. She swept her eyes over her bannerman and her priest and the hill knight was forgotten. 

"We... I... am going... home." Something twitched on the walking corpse's face. Gendry had seen it on Beric's a few times. Something warm and alive beating out from inside a prison of dead flesh, trying to find the world again. Something human. "To find... my daughter..."

Gendry nodded, and promised to himself that if another Stark girl had slinked her way back home, too, he would find her. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, hardly a rousing return, but I had to keep the story rolling. Hope you enjoyed the fresh POV, anyway, and that it wasn't too early.


	41. Chapter 41

**LADY SANSA**

 

 

_"Little bird? Come now, girl, can't rest your eyes all day..."_

_She knew it was a dream, but that made her hold all the tighter. She breathed deep and the sweat from their exertions made her smile, lips a crooked, happily corrupted curve across her face. Hands rough as old parchment were soft as lavender blossoms to her, caressing her shoulders, the line of her throat until they turned her face and she opened her eyes-_

_Found him over her. Smiling down in that secret way he shared with no other. Melting the horror from his face as flesh had been years before. Even so close, with every inch of his brother's evil stamped on him forever. But not his eyes. Not for her. And not in the lips, part-ruined but still warm and hungry, tasting her own at first then rougher and more wanting until she was giggling against them and swatting his bare chest._

_"Because you'd rather have your way with me?"_

_"Strikes me as a good enough way to start the day."_

_"And end the night, if I recall."_

_Comedy. On that face. You'd not believe it and Sansa scarce did, but he cocked his head and mimed a mummer's consternation, bottom lip stuck out for a second, setting her to giggling and sighing again as his hands roved lower._

_"You're not sure? Perhaps I can remind m'lady-"_

_Surely they had **something** to do. Surely she **intended** to say that. But, as was always the way-_

_**Not always. Not ever. Nor will it be.** _

_-his exploration of her, teasing and gentle through and under her shift, struck all words from her tongue. No matter how often they crashed together, or where, or when, each time he overwhelmed her like a high wave over a rowboat. The way his breath chuckled and murmured over her throat, between her breasts. The pads of his fingers chasing down every secret inch of her flesh that send her legs snapping around his waist, no orders from her mind required._

_The way he felt. Filled her. His teeth nipping her shoulder as she gasped into his ear and-_

_Something called from beyond the curtains. A high, screeching call, like a bird in distress. It pierced her lust and the fuzzy glow he threw around her was gone._

_"Sandor, did you hear-"_

_"Shh, little bird. You're missing the best part-"_

_He rolled against her again and fire bloomed low, delicious and aching and shaking her fibers from her core to her stomach and her arms-_

**_How would you know? What it feels like? It will never be him, anyway._ **

_The world trembled as the whisper struck in the center of her mind; some chain pulling her away from him, even as he covered her in the way she wanted so badly._

_The call again. Deeper. Throaty, but stronger. Closer. A shadow flashed across the bright sky and the blazing sun, making her blink-_

_"Sansa? What is it?"_

_She looked up and shadows sprouted around him. Shadow and light all jostling and wrestling and whatever this place was, be it just one room by the sea or a castle on a mountain, it was fit to crumble around her. She clasped her hands to his face and felt tears that weren't there leak onto her cheeks. He just looked confused, lips parted even as she stroked them with her thumb, drew up to kiss him once more._

_"I'm sorry," she choked against him, begging forgiveness of a shade, a dream, a phantom, herself. "I'm sorry."_

_The shadow dropped onto the window ledge and the raven looked at her. Her eyes widened as three black eyes leveled at her and it cawed again, wings spread monstrous and devouring, but it was not a bird's sound but screaming metal and horns-_

++++++++++

"Sansa? Wake up!"

He was there when her eyes snapped open, but it was not the same Sandor. This man's features were tight, drawn, locked shields over his emotions. Only a couple of years past thirty, and Sansa always thought that look made him appear so much older. Torments and troubles and duties weighing him down and crushing him so he looked creased, worn. 

Save his eyes. Alive and vital, they shone with concern as he shook her shoulder, mayhap some drama from her dreams showing on her face and for a moment Sansa flushed at what _else_ she may have hinted to with him in her room.

"I-Yes. A nap, I was-"

"You've been summoned, m'lady," he said shortly, words softened just a mite from his usual brusque snapping. Her sworn shield, after all; he couldn't very well go barking at her. "Stannis has called everyone to the Great Hall."

Which was news enough to chase her sorrow away. Sansa rose to her feet and Sandor drew back, taking her in from his full height. Beyond the door she could hear a riot of noise, an army roaring around _her castle_ , horses and mules and oxen adding to the din from her window in _her castle_ , and yet she had _not_ ordered this. Her lips pressed close and she set her shoulders, flash of her mother coming to her mind and working its way into her bones. 

_This is Winterfell. This is my home. He does **not** cause such uproar **here**. _

"Not just the lords?"

"Everyone, by the sounds of it," Sandor said, already making for the door, letting her trail in his wake like a sprat after a pike, a human ram forcing its way through any commotion in their path. "I've seen all the banners running around like beaten dogs. Looks like he's making ready to march."

The words were tossed over his shoulder as they walked swiftly through the castle, passing clutch after group after troop of soldiers in every livery she could think of in the North (save Bolten, naturally). Men clutched steel and wood, swords and water skins, even flapping chickens to be trussed up or hacked up for the journey ahead, along with men weighed down and rendered near-invisible by mounds of blankets and thicks furs.

_They'll be needing those most of all._

Sansa shook her head and wondered if Stannis had gone mad, or decided that catastrophe was his finest option. Every open window blasted them with icy air, and that was the best of it. Outside the snows were falling in lazy drifts, but she knew well enough that within a few nights the storm would come and might not leave for day after grey, brutal day. She'd heard her father tell of villages swamped and buried in snow before, blotted away in an avalanche-by-inches. She'd seen with her own eyes just how vicious Winter could be on the journey from the crofter's village and now Stannis wanted to set out _again_? 

"It doesn't make sense."

"Hmm?"

"He knows the storm will kill his men and horses, he knows he can't take the Dreadfort, he _told us_ as much. So why does he want to march?"

Sandor paused just long enough for her to know his next words were taking certain liberties with the truth. Probably because every fifth man they passed wore the blazing heart across their armor. "I couldn't say for sure, m'lady."

She waited until they were crossing a narrow courtyard, wind nipping and tugging at her red face above her cloak, before she ventured: "What _would_ you say, then? If you _were_ sure?"

Sharp, furtive eyes flickered around them, then his voice murmured back. 

"I'd say the grim sod has some good news. Reinforcements, maybe. Something that would send him out of here and not too worried about losing half his army to the cold." The two of them turned a corner and a handful of cursing Glover bannermen nearly tripped over themselves skidding to a halt as the towering Hound was suddenly before them. He glared down at them like they'd just stained his shoes and growled out. "Move out the way, damn you!"

They didn't need to be told twice, practically squashed against the wall and muttering their "Milady, milady, sorry, ma'am, Your Grace" as they went skittering away like frightened mice. Sandor huffed as he watched them go and Sansa dipped her chin so he could not see her smile. 

"Something funny?"

"It used to scare me, too. How you snarled at people. "

"No longer, eh?"

"I've seen more of you than them."

The noise dimmed around them, froze them in a bubble she knew would pop in moments. Long enough for his face to tighten again, beating back the smile he couldn't stop racing across his lips. A brief and fragile thing, but Sansa knew it could be no different. He met her gaze and his eyes shone quickly like the sun peeking from behind a cloud, then some fresh voice groused from the Great Hall and he cast his gaze back to the business at hand.

"No argument there, little bird." He squared his shoulders and by the time his armor had settled again, so had his expression. "After you."

She did not quite sweep into the Great Hall where all the commotion was unfolding; she still needed to work on that. Hands folded in front of her and head high, though, she commanded attention. Her hair was a shaking flame that caught eyes not even seeking it, and a dozen lords formerly shouting and arguing back and forth stiffened at her entry and bowed their heads, while all around them squires bowed low and kept up their endless dance of messages and reports and complaints.

"What? Well, where is he?! Root him out from under whatever wench he's crawled under and-"

"Five days, at the most, and we've only half the feed for the mounts, Your Grace! Allow us a day or two, at least to-"

"Damn it, boy, stop fretting over the damn dressing and call the men to order outside! My fucking leg's hardly going to drop off, is it?"

"Lady Stark."

Stannis, of course, did not raise his voice. Ever the calm in the chaos, stock straight and looking more gaunt than ever with a buttoned-up sleeve where his arm had been. She saw the hollowed cheeks and his wrinkles she swore were not there before. The ravages of his journey from Dragonstone to Kings Landing, the Wall and the Wolf's Wood. But his fire, his iron, they had not been dimmed, and again she thought of Sandor.

But the same pride and wonder did not stir. Stannis had purpose again and while she had no mastered a Queen's entrance quite yet, she had certainly become familiar with ambition.

Not to mention rightly suspicious of it.

"Your Grace, why have the men been called to arms?" She stood at the end of the table, hands pressed to the wood, hair streaming from her shoulders. A servant touched a chair to pull out but Sandor dismissed him with a glare, standing stock still behind her. "It seems every man not hobbling or bedridden is ready to march."

"That is so, Lady Stark. My own lords and your own."

"And what, pray tell, makes you think I will allow you to march thousands of Northerners into a worsening storm behind you?"

"You bent the knee, Lady Stark," he said, not softly, not quietly. He was not a King's Landing fop to hide behind finery and gentility; he was the Chosen Of Light Against The Dark and he let the whole table of nobility hear it in his tones. "Now your king requires your men for battle."

"A battle you refused not days before. That you called _folly_ and _suicide_."

"The situation has changed, Lady Stark."

"How?"

That provoked a hush from the lords, and Sansa realized with some shock that they hadn't even asked him. Or he'd simply not told them. Horns blasting, messengers and knights bellowing orders and calling assembly, and not a man jack at the table had even _questioned_ him? Eyes like river ice slid from face to face and some could not meet her gaze. Only Stannis kept it, and he could see some priate war within his mind, deciding whether or not to share something, but _this_ something-

"I am the North, Your Grace," she said, and the girl she'd been flushed in her past to see the iron lady of the Great Hall in the present. "And I do _not_ give my people to slaughter without fair reason."

The air hummed between them, and not only from voices. Stannis' own lords look fit to explode, Florent especially quailing with rage that this Northern girl would dare question his king, his prophet. The Umbers remaining smirked their approval, and even Lord Wyman hid a smile behind a hand that just happened to check the dressing at his neck. Lady Jonelle, her shields close by, did not hide it at all. Finally Stannis' lips pinched and Sansa fancied she could hear the grind of molars as he finally spoke.

"I have received word that a host in my service will soon land on the coast. Here-" he stabbed with his remaining hand at the map spread on the table, anchored by mugs. The Last River, winding like a child's blue scribble from the eastern coast, above the Dreadfort, ending past the Kings Road. His finger slid across the map to the Dreadfort itself, a simple red square that belied the fortress it truly was "-at the river mouth, barely a day's march east of the Dreadfort. They will land there and march west. We will march east and close the trap around the fortress."

"This host, how many are there?"

"Twenty thousand." 

The words dropped like lead stones from the roof and crashed into the empty air. Every pair of eyes popped or narrowed at the idea, the very concept of Stannis Baratheon suddenly in command of such an army, dwarfing the savaged remains the North had mustered at Winterfell. Sansa could see Lord Wyman's chest puffing and emptying quickly, trying to match his shock with his plans. The mountain clans just scowled alongside the Umbers and the Mormonts, the Glovers and the Redwynes, all the northern houses suddenly imagining thousands of foreign boots trampling through their lands. 

"Where-" she swallowed and cursed herself for the slip " _From_ where did you muster such a force?"

"The Free Cities, I admit. Sellswords, the lot of them, loyal only to gold and plunder-"

"Plunder? And _what_ will they be plundering?"

"No property of the North, Lady Jonelle, I can promise you that. Any that think otherwise will not live long enough to regret their mistake."

Lord Florent dipped his head closer, voice hushed, as if the fool could keep his words from so many many packed close. "Sellswords, Your Grace? Must we stoop so-"

"Aye, we _must_ ," Stannis snapped back, sharp enough to send Florent's head jerking back as if from a snarling wolf. "If there are not enough fighting men to be found _here_ , then we must import them. The Iron Bank has secured their services and Ser Massey says they come recommended by Nestoris himself." He dipped his head to Sansa and her puzzled face. "A representative of the Bank, who has... who speaks for them and my claim to the Iron Throne."

 _Meaning that they think you've a better chance to make them rich than the Lannisters or the Tyrells or what Targaryns are left,_ she thought, but calculation was ruined all too quickly by fevered hope, her brother's mugging face back in her mind. 

"Twenty thousand will be more than enough to storm the Dreadfort. The Bastard may even surrender, once he sees the size of the force set against him. King Stannis, if we offered terms on arrival-"

"We have sent terms, Lady Stark. He has rejected them or ignored them."

She didn't even notice his interruption; though the angry murmurs should have warned her she shook them from her ears and gods there was that _pleading_ in her voice again, just an ember of it.

"Your Grace, he does not know the army marching on him. He thinks we are a few thousand wounded souls in Winterfell, not a fresh army ten times the size. He would release my brother, any sane man would-"

"He is no sane man, Lady Stark, as we have seen."

His voice ground on, relentless as everything else about the man. He made to clasp his hands then seemed to remember he had only the one, so settled for resting it on his hip. The words that followed nearly drowned the rafters in shouts but he plowed forward. Sansa's lips parted and her jaw lowered as they went.

"This fleet, this army, brings siege equipment with it. Once it has landed and encircled the Dreadfort, I will give the order for them to commence bombardment. Not only with rock and stone, but flaming barrels and bales. We will rain fire upon the Dreadfort, batter its gates, storm its towers-"

Voices rose, blasting out in outrage but he would not be moved. He had his army now, and Sansa saw the change of a man with real power again. The power to obliterate and worse, do so in a cause he wholly believed in. 

"-and House Bolton will be burned from the world forever, in the name of the Lord of Light."

 

**NIALL**

_Well, that went over like a wet fart in a sept._

His arms still stung from sparring and his legs ached from pounding up the stones, but his ears were working fine. He heard Stannis droning on and on, until he realized it wasn't droning. "Rickon". Another Stark, one of the few left. The King In The North's youngest brother. One day he was alive, another dead, another missing. Now the North knew he was alive, with that bastard of bastard's in the Dreadfort.

So many men were shouting that it wasn't words, just a great, dumb noise too full to make any kind of sense. All Niall heard was fragments as he pushed and slid his way past shoulders and around arms. Sandor rose like a tree among a thicket of lords, swinging his shaggy, battered skull swung around to him the moment he got within ten feet of the Queen.

Well, she wasn't a Queen _then_. Not with a crown, anyway. But you could see it; a blind man could. The rightful King of Westeros had just sentenced her little brother to death in the flames and she stood there. She faced him down. Her face was pinched and white, another dead Stark in her eyes. Her tongue was still behind her lips and she was shaking her head, willing words to come but they just wouldn't, until-

"You... He'll _die!_ "

Stannis was already looking back at his map. Niall had seen men with stone faces before, but that grim sod looked like his had been carved from a cliff. He stared down at parchment and wooden models, each one a fortress, an army, a lordly house, something to be used or destroyed, with eyes that _should_ have burned. Lord of Light. Azor... something, Niall didn't even bloody remember that Fire God bollocks. But there was no fire there, no life. He saw eyes like that years later, in dead men that still moved. 

No light, no fire. Just will. Will and iron. 

"This is war, Lady Stark. Mayhap the _last_ war. Winter marches from beyond the Wall, and the night comes with it." His gaze flickered back to her for a moment. The lords were still prattling and sputtering but his voice seemed to cleave through them all, Northern and Stormlands, sellsword and clansman. "Good men die in war. Sometimes more on the side of the victors than the vanquished, and boys die just as easily. The Boltons are a _distraction_. I aim to end them by the next moon and make ready the North for the horrors to come."

"Do you really think," her voice was a hiss, something low and venomous and Niall never thought to hear it slither from that lovely face. Even Sandor blinked, something Niall had learned was as close to a gasp he could manage when he was on his guard. "I, and these lords, the North at all, will just _let you_ butcher Rickon Stark?"

Things didn't get louder; they got very quiet. In Niall's experience, that was always more dangerous. Give him a man in the heat of a battle, at least you know what he's about, sword swinging and spit flying. But calm men with hands quivering around their blades, all still and stony and crackling in their eyes. That was the whole room, for just a moment, and you could feel the daggers swinging over their heads. One stupid bastard moving too fast, one scrape of a sword out of a scabbard, and they'd be cleaning bits of nobility out of the floor for weeks. 

A touch at his arm and he nearly jumped, but bit down at the impulse. Even one fast move at that moment could have set any number of idiots to violence. He turned and she as there, eyes wide and her comely face shaking slightly, looking down...

... at his hand over his sword. He hadn't even realized he was gripping it. Battle instincts he supposed. He frowned, tension draining from him for a moment as the rest of the room soaked in it, replaced by confusion.

Had he moved? He must have. He was at Sandor's side, behind Sansa, but now he was further away, in front of the Lady Jonelle.

"Don't."

She whispered the word and there was urgency clamoring in her eyes. Something close to fear, not for herself, but for him, and Niall's lips parted silently. Awed. 

_You moved to her, not to Lady Sansa's._

_Instincts._

Leather creaked and mail rustled, breaking the moment and the spell. He turned back to the eye of the storm and in it, Stannis stood tall. Even with one arm, he didn't look weak. He was patient and his eyebrows twitched a touch higher, trying to climb the balding dome of his head. He set a hand in his belt, nowhere near his sword, and looked to the direwolf growling above us all. 

"In this Hall, Lady Stark? Your father's hall? You'd swear allegiance one day and then cut down your King the next? Or just throw him into a dungeon, mayhap?"

"He is my _br_ -"

"He is a _casualty of war_. Or he might be. Sieges are uncertain, and he will be in a cell. Safest place to be, I'd wager, if everyone else in a castle was being butchered."

Niall looked to Lady Stark and Niall never wanted to much to comfort a girl. She was trembling from the inside out, her breathing coming out so hard it was like she'd been stabbed, or flayed, or both. Her eyes were wide and weren't focusing, chains no-one could see pinning her. Because the bastard, that never-smiling southron bore, was right. Old Ned sat in the seat of that table. He'd dispensed his justice and heard the fears of small folk and noble alike, all with his daughters and sons bouncing on his knee or sitting by his side. The bastards had taken so much from her, from them. Family and lands and blood and tears. Now there was something more to be gouged away, leaving nothing but a corpse behind but if the price was ripping her father's name to shreds...

"Duty, Lady Stark."

There was a grinding, muted screech like a rockfall down a distant mountain. Niall had to blink a few times before I realized it was Sandor. And now Stannis was looking at _him_.

Then at _her_.

Then he shook his head.

_You sly **bastard**._

"We are all bound by duty. This is mine. You know yours. I will beseech the Lord of Light to spare your brother. But I _will_ storm the Dreadfort, and if I cannot, I _will_ burn it down to its lowest stones, if that's what must be done to end this sideshow and steer this kingdom back towards its true purpose: the Others and their horde."

Niall wanted to shout. He wanted to snap and snarl at Stannis like those ungodly beasts they'd found in the kennels; the Bastard's "children", now gratefully put to the sword and filling the bellies of the smallfok they'd so terrorized. But he was still a little man in a room full of giants in name and title; the lords were grousing, arguing, shaking their heads with their eyes wide and powerless. 

_She had bent the knee. She gave her word. She pledged her loyalty, and that meant she pledged theirs, too._

"I'll see to your brother, Lady Sansa."

For a moment, Niall had an awful feeling that he'd said that. And he'd need a change of breeches. But the collected gaze of the room didn't swing his way, but rather to the armored Southron who shirked not an inch under their scrutiny. Sandor Clegane tilted his chin up a fraction and locked eyes with Stannis.

"I'll ride with you on behalf of the Starks, and Lady Sansa. You want to take the Dreadfort? So be it, no-one here will change your mind. But I'll be there to make sure the last surviving Stark son has a fighting chance at coming home."

"I'll make no guarantees for your shield's safety, Lady-"

"I'm not _asking_ for any," Sandor shot back before the false assurance was even complete, earning him a quick glare and stiff shoulders. "Haven't needed any bloody guarantees to survive a battle before, doubt I'll need them now."

More words were being said than spoken, Niall could tell it. There seemed to be a flow and ebb to them that was all in the eyes, and it wasn't just him that was following the Hound and the King battering back and forth. Stannis opened his mouth to speak but then his jaw snapped it shut ugain. Some volle he'd decided not to loose? Niall could guess where it would aim. Not at Sandor, but back at his lady, and what may have been-

_But he can't bring it to the light. Can't even touch on it._

 

**SANDOR**

It was always easier when it was sword and strength brought to bear. Sandor was not a snickering little cunt like Littlefinger or Varys, skilled in the art of spinning pretty words and moving men around like _cyvasse_ pieces. He killed and he ensured other killers failed. That was what he understood and he was too bloody old to start learning "the game". Not that life cared, of course. It never did. He was sworn shield to the highest-born lady in The North. That came with trouble that didn't always bear dagger or quarrel.

 _This is what you **want**_ , Sandor tried to scream with his eyes, half-knowing the stodgy Baratheon would be as deaf and blind as a crone to it. _You want me away from her, and I want to make sure the wolf boy is safe. We **both** get what we want!_

"A sworn shield stays by his liege or liegewoman," Stannis prattled off like he was reading from a book, and Sandor felt the leather and metal in his gauntlets crunch as he made them into fists. "That is his place, not at a distant siege."

"That is for _me_ to decide, King Stannis."

Sandor turned and kept his face impermeable as the wall behind her. She looked up and nodded, throwing up her own barriers, but not before he saw a glimmer of panic flash to him. He was leaving her. Twice in as many days, he was seeking his escape, and he felt his stomach tighten as he imagined betrayal in her gaze. But he thanked her, too. At least one of them knew how to play the game. 

"You are charged with returning Rickon to me, Clegane," she said, loud enough for all to hear and stop that humorless sod from claiming otherwise. "If he is alive, bring him back from the Dreadfort. If-" He voice trembled, but recovered quick and sure as a running deer. Sandor felt his teeth grind together again. She'd become an old hand a grief, and at hiding it. Now it took almost nothing at all. "-if he is not... bring him back, that he might rest with his kin."

He gave a short bow and looked to Stannis, but only as a courtesy. His vows were to her, not him, and if the North would march with Stannis, that would mean he'd go, too. Stannis had no authority to decide who could march, and Sandor knew he didn't particularly care, as long as they all followed his sacred fucking commands. But this? This was different. The two of them, the damage they posed, now he saw cogs turning in the "Prophet's" head. Satisfaction flickered across his face as he saw a solution to the rumors.

"Very well, Clegane."

Sandor turned on his heel and marched from the hall, knights and squires and lords all shirking from his path.

++++++++++

He remembered the stables of Winterfell well enough, though of course they hadn't stunk so badly of dried blood back then. As he'd heard it, a clutch of Boltons had made their last stand there, holding the gate and then fighting back and back until they were pressed to the wall and the final man died standing, pierced and speared to the wall. Sandor glanced over Stranger's saddle and looked at that spot. There was a stain that wouldn't be going anywhere soon.

_Brave men. Wrong side._

Horses stamped and men scurried around them, but no-one bothered The Hound, of course. He was alone to go about his business, readying Stranger for another journey, hard bread and even harder meat and cheese tucked into his saddlebags. He lifted up one hoof after another and glowered at his shoes, long enough for the stallion to give him an impatient huff before he was through. 

"Can't be too careful," he murmured to the black beast, patting its neck as he set his longsword on the saddle. "Long ride ahead."

The stall door creaked and Sandor crushed the boyish hope in him that longed for red hair and blue eyes to see him off. That was the _point_ of this, after all: putting distance between them. Stalling the rumors by showing those bastards that he was not tied to her hip like a lover. Sandor knew that, but as his hands worked and Stranger was prepared, some eel was still squirming in him. Something he couldn't shut up.

_I wanted to say goodbye. Stupid dog. You've said goodbye before._

Niall looked over man and horse and Sandor could see the boy was ready to leave. Frey sword at one hip, dirk at his other, armor clean and not a piece of it missing. Behind him a young colt was waiting with saddlebags full and Clegane shook his head out of instinct.

"No."

"You don't know what I was-"

"Fine, go ahead."

"I'm coming with-"

" _No_. There. We done?"

Niall pursed his lips and squirmed them from side to side, but he did not leave. He rested a hand on his sword and took a few steps closer. Sandor's lips quirked at one side. Had it really only been days since they'd met? No more than twenty or so, he'd wager. He remembered a quivering little brat with a quick mouth and scared eyes, terrified to even look at him. Now there was a man in armor and a fine sword and scars to prove he was worthy of carrying it. A boy hollow had been filled with courage and horror and stern stuff that was staring down Sandor Clegane. 

"I'm not _asking_."

"Don't play the fucking hero with me, boy, and don't think to throw my own words back at me. You ain't me, I ain't Stannis, and you don't need to go."

"Still want to."

"Why?"

The knight-to-be didn't tilt his chin nor strike some heroic pose. It wasn't his nature, Sandor supposed, and that they had in common. Instead he jerked his head to the stable gates, where an endless procession of horses and carts and foot-slogging infantry were marching past, banners waving sadly over them in the snow-choked air. 

"Might be a good bit of glory on this road. Siege at the Dreadfort, after all. The last Bolton keep. They'll sing songs. Grant titles, rewards."

"You're still a shite liar when it comes to me, boy."

"Maybe I wanted you to see the lie."

Sandor ground his teeth, tiring and  _fast_ of this sparring. He flung the last of his provisions over Stranger's flank and snatched up his bridle, ebon monstrosity instantly sizing up the smaller, paler mount Niall had ready to go. "Then speak the truth and get out of my-"

"You're my _friend_ , you stupid bastard. None _else_ here will watch your back, so it's up to me, isn't it?"

Sandor had to blink a few times and hold back from his first instinct, which was lay the mouthy little cunt out for calling him "bastard". There he stood, almost a foot shorter and a few dozen pounds lighter, not letting The Hound go until he'd had his say. Sandor leaned closer and his words were low and venomous.

"I. Don't. _Need_. Your. _Fucking_. Help."

Men had heard that voice seconds before their end. So quick and so nasty they couldn't do anything to stop it. It was either their final warning or their last memory. But Niall swallowed and breathed deep; when it came out, it was a shudder and yet, his eyes didn't move. He shook his head and Sandor's jaw dropped a touch. He couldn't smell nor see the lie anymore. Not a trace of it, and that worried him even more.  

"Not got the time to explain this to you, Sandor," the boy said quietly, with more calm in his voice than he probably felt. "But I'm going. Because that's what friends do. They go even when they're not needed, or told to by a lord, or there's a purse at the end of the road. You don't want that? Cut me down or tie me to the wall. Anything else is just a waste of time."

Sandor stood like a monolith for longer than he meant to. Studied the young man and cursed him in his head and some of them slurred out of his mouth and before he knew it the horns were blasting again and the shake and crash of armored northern cavalry was trembling the ground. The last of the lords were leaving. Finally his lips curled back. Frustration was easier, too. Easier than gratitude, and he'd precious little practice at that. 

"Don't get in my way, lad," he said as he shouldered past Niall and decided to ignore the grin that bloomed across his face. "Hard march ahead, and that'll be a joy compared to what's at the end of it."

The two of them mounted and cantered out into the yard. They sidled into the rear formation and as they reached the Eastern Gate, Sandor felt Niall's boot tap his own. He glanced at him, who was glancing up, and he followed it-

Saw what he wanted to on a high balcony. Streaming fire against grey stone. Warm blue on a face flushed from the cold. She looked down at him and turned her hand, a flash of grey and blue looped around her palm. Sandor smiled at it. At the gesture. At the memory. At the band of cloth she'd favored him with the night before he and Niall and the clansmen had left for the caves.

The one wrapped around his wrist now, that he passed his hand over, and felt her touch and her softness in.  

She mouthed something. Two words. Sandor glanced around and smiled as he realized Niall had chosen their company well. Stocky mountain clansmen swaddled in heavy furs, axes and clubs and swords over their shoulders and eyes fixed ahead. They gave less of a shit about rumor than even he did, and he took no fear as he looked back up, just before they were out of sight. 

Two words for two words. Silent on his lips but his eyes made them a vow, from him, of all bloody people. The smile she gave him after would warm him through the drifts.

_I will._


	42. Chapter 42

  **SHIREEN**

"Damn silly place to put a hill."

There was a snicker to her back that, as a well-mannered young woman, Shireen decided to politely ignore. Instead she focused on brushing and shooing the carpet of leaves and twigs off her clothes. It was hardly a fall, really. More of an elongated and _very_ lucky roll through a patch of shrubbery that didn't include anything with rocky edges of thorns. Or slumbering things of fur and fang not expecting a rude awakening from a cursing, spluttering young Learning Lady rolling pell mell down the slope.

"I _did_ tell you to watch your step, Shiry."

She huffed and he just grinned wider, brambles in her hair making her look like an especially peeved birdsnest. Soon the grin grew a voice and it chuckled and she turned away again, digging through her hair. Normally she would steal a thief's plunder of glances at him, leaning against the tree with his arms crossed over his chest, face split in amusement, canines a touch longer than she thought normal glinting, winking at her. Not then. 

_Gods, is that a **weevil**?_

"Well," she said with a scowl at the flailing little insect between her fingers, before deciding to flick him back into the comfy bush he came from. And she landed in. "At least you were down here quickly to help a lady out."

Rickon's snort was almost like branch breaking, wry look plastered over his tanned face as he pushed himself off from the tree and started to amble along the green valley between the hill she had fallen down and the one next to it. He called over his shoulder as he went, Shaggy obediently trotting at his side like a young horse. 

"Like you need the help?"

"And _what_ is _that_ supposed to mean?"

"You're hardly some soft-palmed, perfumed lady who's never so much as washed a dish, Shiry," he said, tone a queer mix of resigned and amused, like an old tale played out between them, but one she never tired of hearing. "I might have started for a moment when I saw you start to tumble, but I wasn't worried. I've seen you take worse."

The girl gave a bitter smile he could not see, but on her lips was the only place she felt it. There was no barb in his voice, no sting to his words. Only the two of them knew the truth of what they'd suffered. Not Sandor or Sansa or Niall or the bannermen or lords. Only the dead, and them, tromping through the Wolfswood and alive as ever. It bound them, and Shireen always knew if nothing else, Rickon and her would have that. Horrors and nightmares. Those nights as children she'd stirred and found him huddled next to her in bed, afraid of the dark silence in his room.

Sometimes it was he that stirred, instead. 

Maudlin thoughts trickled into her mind. She didn't want them, not that day. Even rolling down a hill when she wasn't watching her step was a dwarf adventure, something to stop herself from thinking, and looking, which is what she did now-

Eyes fixed on the way the muscles of his back pulsed and squeezed without any skin to cover them. Angry, livid stretches of his back ripped clean like those strange yellow fruits she'd sampled once in White Harbor, his back peeled like their skins, exposing all underneath. Red muscle and stretched sinew. 

The sight alone grabbed her and threw her back into the years of cold and death. She blinked and just for that fraction in between her fluttering lids, she imagined she saw that curled and shuddering ball they'd returned to Winterfell with. Screaming in his sleep and snarling in his waking. 

_That is no longer the case. Stop treating him like a boy and be **helpful**!_

She studied them again and it was the healer that did so, not the friend or former princess. Rickon had long since stopped feeling the pain in the lengths of battered muscle, but every now and then they would ooze or flake and she remembered something-

"Have you been using your ointment?"

Rickon paused and looked over his shoulder. Even Shaggy cocked his head as if to silently scold her. 

"For my back?"

"Um, well... yes."

"Quite the change of subject."

"It's Summer," she said quickly, letting her eyebrows ride high and sliding into her Learning Lady tone within a blink. "The heat and changes in the weather can form molds and sores quicker than-"

"Alright, _alright_ ," the groan was almost pained, even from a lifelong warrior, and Rickon lurched back onto his path. "Yes, I've been using the-"

"Well, pardon me for being _concerned_ for you!"

"Was this your plan?" He was speeding up now, stamping and hammering through the grass and mud, words chopping out his mouth fast as his pace. "Get me alone to badger me all the way back to Winterfell? Couldn't that have waited a few hours?"

Shireen could feel the ground under her tremble with his mood but she gritted her teeth and pushed on, unwilling and unbending. _Fitting_ , some part of her mind thought, a little fatalistically. _Like father._  

"Gods, is this how you speak to _all_ women?" He turned on her and found not a girl but a lady, stomping towards him and damn well tired of his jibes. Shireen had to admit, it was a little gratifying to see a few frantic blinks blind Rickon for a moment, probably as his mind processed the fact that she wasn't stopping. "I can imagine the ladies of Winterfell _throw_ themselves at your feet with that silver tongue!"

There was that smirk again, a tome of lechery in a few inches of amused lips. Crude and conceited and she had to remind herself that no, she did not find that attractive. Not at all. Oh, no. 

"Maybe they're not using their _ears_ , Shiry."

"More the fools them, then."

He sighed and rolled his eyes and Shireen would have rapped the knuckles of any cocky wildling pup that _dared_ treat her so in her solar. But they weren't at Last Hearth: they were slogging through the Wolfswood and Rickon Stark was not an unruly boy to be smacked. He turned from her and his face vanished, the full sight of him withdrew and grew smaller and all she could see was his receding form, his scars-

"Rick?!"

"I'm not playing anymore, princess." He didn't slow, didn't stop, didn't look at her. His feet were probably weary from a day's hunting and he didn't have time for squawking little Learning Ladies with their constant whining. "We're losing the light and Winterfell is still miles away."

She balled her fists and wanted to throw them at him. She grit her teeth and wanted insults to chatter from them like a swarm of bees. She wanted to wrap her arms around his back and lock him there, _both_ of them there, where time and stupid arguments couldn't hurt them. But none of these things happened. The woods chirped and rustled around them and Rickon kept walking. Only when Shaggy paused and made a curious little sound in his throat (well, "little" for a wolf the size of a pony) did he finally pause, scowling through a curtain of hair. 

_Stop trying to be clever. Just tell him._

"I-"

Whatever brewed in her heart, it must have shown on her face, because she saw something peek out behind his eyes. Something that hid behind the swaying brown hair and smoothed his brow from a glower into an honest, intent expression. Leaves crinkled as he turned full-on and the forest hushed. Shaggy licked his nose. Humans were such odd and roundabout creatures. Shireen caught her breath and felt that familiar tingle rise to her cheek. The marred on. The stony length from brow to throat that every maester and healer had said was beyond touch and sensation.

They knew nothing. She felt him from twenty feet and years before and no, to the hells, she _would_ tell him and-

She felt that terror. She heard her mother's words. Her last words. Her own words and they crushed her down until what came out was the truth in the moment and a lie both.

"I don't want to fight." Her voice was not small, but it held no heat. It was tired and it was sad and as she crunched the twigs under her feet she spoke and he did not look away. "We always fight and jibe and spar with each other. I sick of that."

Just a hint of a pinch along his tanned brow. Suspicious. Just like Shaggy around a new guard in the garrison. But it didn't last. It was like the snow that fell in the Summer; cold and blinding for a night, an afternoon, then gone by midday. "Always seems to be the way with us," he said, voice a grumble between barely-parted lips.

She dared to smile, dared more when it grew, crooked and sloping across her face, stoked with memories.

"It didn't used to be. Remember the-"

"Raven?"

She was almost certain it wasn't raining, but Shireen still felt ice water soak her when he finished the sentence for her with a word she wasn't thinking of. She wanted to drop like a stone and bury her face but he'd pinned her, the cunning sod, with that same smile. Lazy and amused and coming with a hiss of soft laughter through his nose, shoulders bobbing until his lips seemed to split and the Wolf Prince showed his teeth.

"The one that got loose. Damned thing just didn't want to get back in his cage."

_I remember you touched my curse and stroked the skin around it. I remember wanting you to kiss me._

"What did you think of? Gods, we had, I dunno, a dozen little schemes to lure him back in, what was the one that worked?"

_I remember I should have done it myself. Even if you never looked at me like that again._

"Erm..." Thus came her rousing arrival to the discussion, when she'd blinked back confusion and kicked her brain into a useful tro again. "Parch- _ahem_ -Parchment. I, um... I thought that it-"

"I think it was a 'he'."

"Really? No, yes, he was! Aleg, no, wait... Ale-"

"Alezin?"

"Alezin!"

A burst of noise and Shaggy's somber snout split into a panting, tongue-lolling grin as the humans were laughing all of a sudden. The shake and tremble of her shoulders, the sheer relief of the noise rushing through her, Shireen gave into it and drove back the voice clamoring at her to just spill her guts and be done with it. She nodded and giggled and held up a finger as she walked over at his side, both of them in step again for Winterfell.

"That was it! After that sellsword captain! Mother, I haven't thought of him in years."

Rickon swayed his pace and bumped her gently with his shoulder and Shireen cursed herself for a coward. If she couldn't have him, couldn't _admit_ to him, then she'd take these warm moments instead. His familiar touch as he walked her friend, if nothing else. The wind rushed down the valley and she batted the hair from her face. His eyes were dancing and as always, she felt that tension flee from her. She was a girl again, at ease with a wild young man gone to Skagos, before the End of Night. 

"And you thought if you put a nice, plump message into his cage, he wouldn't be able to resist."

"They _are_ bred to recognize messages."

"Didn't quite work, did it?"

She sighed and pursed her lips, but the smile forced through them until it came out in a laugh through her nose. She looked ahead to the next band of trees, fire beetles winking through the air like Childrens' eyes. "No. But we _did_ get him in, eventually."

"What happened to him, anyway?"

"Man or bird?"

"I _know_ what happened to the man. What about the bird?"

Shireen smiled and snaked her arm in the crook of his own at it hung next to her. She barely realized she was doing it, but when she felt the muscle under there and the quick stiffening give way, she smiled up at him instead. Enough for one night, mayhap. No more words tossed back and forth like stones between warring giants. Winterfell was a hard walk but she knew how fast those went in the right company. 

"Who do you think I sent to tell you I was coming?"

Then, of course, Rickon had to go and spoil it.

**RICKON**

"To tell me you're leaving, you mean?"

Damn. He'd said something wrong, he could tell. The sly little quirk of her lips flattened like someone had hit it with a hammer and her fingers retreated just a fraction from his arm. Rickon had to force himself not to reach out and grasp her hand before it could fall away from him. He could feel the light touch of her curled around it. Soft and gentle, strong and sure, familiar and foreign all at once. She was a girl no longer, hadn't been once since they'd come to the Last Hearth eight years before, when the Long Night was over and there were kingdoms to rebuild, and so few willing, able hands to do it. The North was worst of all, but Shireen had not faltered at the task before her.

She had seen the worst and cried and begged and even in doing all that, still faced it. She rode in leathers and boots, not dresses and sandals, and her Wildlings at Last Hearth respected her. Her, who'd been "cursed" and "marked" and now they brought their sick babes to, pleading with the Learning Lady to help.

"Yes, I, ah." He's still staring at her, sightless and faraway, when he realizes they've stopped walking. Damn. That probably was a mistake, too. "I thought it best to tell you ahead of time. Just in case..."

The words trailed off and Rickon saw the evasion flash over her features. It confused him. Buggeration, this whole _thing_ confused him. Why was he ever hunting down the truth of things like he was fishing for eels in muddy water? Why did it always have to be hard and complicated. He curled his lips slightly, scented the lie behind her lips sure as Shaggy did that stag. Words coming out low.

"In case what? Shireen?" He turned to face her and her arm did not slide far from his before his hand grasped it and she gasped. Looked almost afraid and Rickon ignored it, knew only in his warrior mind that he was close to some victory. "You were going to say something."

"Rickon, I-"

"Tell me. What is it? Are you-" 

"You're hur-hurting..."

Her voice came out in a sob that made every vein in his body freeze. He gaped for a second and her thin whimper echoed his skull, gone suddenly and massively empty of all thought. A wriggle against his fingers. Squirming. He looked down and saw his rough, rude hand clamped around hers and she twisting it but going nowhere. He forced himself to look up, even though he didn't want to see her eyes.

Composed. Unblinking. The face she wore for everyone, but he wasn't fooled. He knew her of old, and could see her fear in the rocketing fall-and-rise of her Adam's apple and the flush of her cheeks. Rickon's mind clicked into gear again and he let go, nearly grunted at the speed with which she drew her arm away, like he would snap it off if he got closer. His mouth worked but no sound came out and a dozen voices warred and clashed in his head until he spluttered-

"Im sorry-"

"Rick, I-"

-and their words crashed right into each other. They paused and shy smiles were flashed and Rickon shook his head, gestured to her a gently as he could. _Try to think of her like a foal_ , he thought, trying to assume the gentlest mind he could think of. _You don't want her to be skittish, but you want her to pay attention._

_She's not fucking **livestock** , fool!_

"Rick." Well, that shut both of them up quickly, and the rest. He rested his eyes on her, no, more than rested, bored them into her, wide and ringed by his crown of mud-brown hair. "You have to control your temper, you know. Can't go snapping at people just because you think they might be hiding something."

_ Don't change the subject! Just tell me the- _

-but the words didn't come, though his mouth and tongue were opened and poised to deliver them. He felt that frustration buzzing in his ears and making them scorch again, saw that familiar look as she almost shrank from him. He remembered. What had she said? You must learn from your mistakes. Everyone can be forgiven for one mistake, but a man who keeps making them is a fool, and cannot grow.

He'd erred once. He wouldn't again. Not with her.

"I didn't mean it," he said, wincing as he realized what a green damn boy he sounded like. He wanted to badly for them to argue again. At least he knew where he stood with that. Anything else was murky and mysterious and, well, look where it ended. Shireen with her arms folded across her chest and him glancing around up and down and around and anywhere but her, like he couldn't stand to. 

_ And she's used to that, isn't she? _

He'd hurt her. He didn't mean to, but meaning to counted for nothing. He swallowed and willed her to look at him, but she didn't and finally that frustration came back and he pointed it somewhere else-

He reached out and placed his hand under hers. Didn't grip or hold or even tighten. Just let it sit there, heat from both warming both, until she swallowed again and looked him flush in the face. He watched and hoped until a shaky smile was there and he grinned back. 

"Apology accepted."

"Seems like I'm always saying sorry."

A tiny squeeze. Just enough to let him know he was forgiven. He always was, of course, but it didn't make the waiting any easier. He felt something, and he heard her words in his head, her advice and her stories and if he couldn't tell his teacher, then-

"Feels like I'm wearing shackles, sometimes," he said, and he was so enamored with the sight of his hand in hers he didn't see the surprise on her face. "When I'm out here, I can't feel them. But when I have to go back, or I'm with the lords, or some-sometimes with you? Feels like I'm heavy and clumsy and I don't know what to say."

"So you get angry instead?"

He managed a smile, just in one corner. A sad and regretful thing, the kind a man gives when he has to look inward and if he didn't smirk at what he saw, he'd weep or snarl instead. The sight of her blue eyes peering into him was enough for it to spread, though. "Or just rude."

"Well, I can attest to _that_." 

They laughed in that little clearing between two green hills in the middle of the woods, with no sounds of Man to spoil it, but Rickon still felt the shackles. Strange waters, that's what they were, and every length he traveled he did so blind. But Shireen was there and that quelled so much he couldn't put a name to. Of their own accord his fingers tightened around her hand, and she responded. She held her hand and Rickon swallowed his nerves.

_A few days. Then she'll be gone. Then you won't have to feel like thus anymore._

Rickon gave that same smile; mocked the lie he told himself, that even he knew was false. Then her hand slid from his grip and shattered that bitter thought, slid up his arm to his shoulder and he followed it, flesh and cloth until he was looking in her eyes again.

"I am leaving soon," she said, "And I don't want my last days her for gods-know-how-long to be spent bickering and blustering with you, Rick. I want them to be happy."

"You'll come back, won't you?" He couldn't keep the worry from his voice; didn't even know where it came from. "I know it's far to go, but there are still, well, I mean, the Last Hearth will need another-"

"Of course I will." It was one of those smiles that you couldn't help but mimic. His lips stretched with hers until it touched inside him, her delicate, confident fingers loosening the ribs that were crushing it. Rickon cocked his head to the side and felt the back of her her hand become his pillow there, enough for him to huff out a breath of relief. "All I care for is here."

_In these woods? In this kingdom? In your hand at this moment? All? None?_

He wanted to vomit the words and get his precious truth, but Rickon knew he'd done enough today. He sighed and sagged inward a little, but it was not the empty feeling he thought it would be. She forgave him. That was all he needed and he smiled warmer, wider. She wanted a good few days? Fine. He owed her a lifetime of laughter, but if a few turns of the Sun was all he had, he would make them enough. Give her memories warm and real and mayhap if he gave her enough, even the boundless wisdom she'd sup on at Oldtown would not make her forget it. 

"Let's go home," he said firmly, tones that of a man determined not to dwell but to march forward. He took her hand and squeezed it again, taking some small pleasure in knowing he could do that and not have her flinch or frown in surprise. If anything, she seemed please.

_Remember that._

A concerned and persistent snout pressed into the air between them, befuddled snuffling sending warm jets shooting against their hands until they both placated the restless Shaggy with scratches behind the ear and neck. 

"Good idea. Shaggy seems eager to be home."

"Eager to be _fed_ , you mean."

As if on cue, there was a rumbling like a rockslide into a lake and they both looked down... then at Shireen, who'd turned red as leaves in Autumn.

"Well, he, ah.... he might not be the _only_ one."

**DONAL**

"Look, we can't bugger around all day with this."

Nine pounds of stubborn mongrel whined and shuffled a little closer to the hulking human with his hands on his hips. Snout resting on his front paws. Eyes wide and gazing upwards.

"Oh, no, we're not sodding around with _that_ shite. _You_ need to get used to it out here, and I need to get gone. So _fuck off_ , already!"

He threw his arm out over the pup's head, a gesture wrapped in plate and mail that got even sers scampering back home - _not your home; not anymore_ \- but the pup was clearly not impressed. It looked up, studied the iron-wrapped finger, then looked behind itself. A few lazy blinks at the rotting mess behind butcher's row and it decided that hulking human was more interesting. The man called "Donal" sighed and tipped his head back, beseeching the sky for aid and getting only a light patter across his face instead.

Stranger snuffled behind him. Clearly amused by all this, at least until it came to the point of getting wet. 

_He's an old man, too. Doesn't like the soak in his bones._

"Stupid bastard."

He knew what he should do, but whenever he heard a yip or or a yowl his hands were stayed. He remembered the kennels at Winterfell, at Clegane Keep, wondered idly like he did every few years if it was even standing anymore. Probably not, or so he hopes. Best to burn it to ash and start afresh, after a lifetime of Gregor seeping into the stones. But the kennels, he knew them well, and if there were a place where he was not The Hound, it was in them. He stroked the pup's head and felt bumps and contusions through his gauntlet, followed swiftly by that swell of righteous, liquid fury in his lungs.

"You can't go with me, you bloody fool. Look? See them?" He cupped the little creature's muzzle and turned it around, facing the mounds of bones and gristle, surrounded by whole aviaries of flies, bloated and lazy. Flickers and flashes of fur among the mounds, fellow scavengers. Pup's new family. "Plenty of meat there, I'd wager. Couldn't let you go on the land past the city. Can't get there and get back in time. But I can't give you to anyone and could't leave you with those smithy cunts, so here we be. New hom. Fresh start. You ain't even gotta thank me and Strangers' fucking balls-"

"Donal" covered his hand with his face and groaned at what age and loneliness did to a man.

"-I'm talking to a fucking _dog_."

_Like people were so much more bloody amenable._

He can't see it, but Donal, Sandor, whoever he is in that moment, feels the furry snout gently rest on his thigh. Even that's enough to make him think of the capering sods back ho-back at _Winterfell_ , who ran about him with their tongues lolling and tails wagging and never cared for his face. All of them raised from tiny, squirming pup to strong hound, with him and Kennelmaster Myron. He looked from beneath his hand and found those soft brown eyes looking up at him, wanting yet more affection, more attention, and not caring enough for dignity to have any scruples when it came to the getting. 

"Changed yer bloody tune right quick, didn't you?" He growled the words but like an idiot, scratched behind the pup's ears, anyway. "Couldn't even look at me a few hours ago."

_Loyal. Best quality._

A din from his right and he could hear wooden slats and window boards slamming shut, one after the other, just before and just after the great, dull boom of a bell across the city. Some bell nestled in a spire struck the hour over and over, until six heavy tolls filled the air, then settled on the marshland city and sank into the bricks and bog. Sandor sighed again, spied the sun starting to wane. A fuzzy ball of falling light behind a sheet of clouds, already dropping drizzling streams over Braavos like a million gnats taking a piss. The Westerosi ground his teeth and screwed shut his eyes.

_I don't have time for this._

They opened. Blinked and saw an animal desperate for something, someone, _anyone_ , all alone in the world.

"It can't be me," he murmured, tones so low and mournful all who knew him would claim he was possessed. "I can't help you."

Sandor swallowed, and the decision came fast but not easy. Hard choices. Gods, hadn't he had plenty of those in his past, and some of those decided the fates of thousands, not just the life of a dog. He held onto that thought as he rose up to his full height, letting the pup get back on all fours, body tensed and eyes wide, sure they'd be going to some new-

"Fuck off with you!"

-Sandor's boot lashed out instead. A _calculated_ blow, one that shuddered all the way to his soul when it connected, but when it was a boot from a big man wrapped in leather and metal, that didn't mean a _soft_ blow. The pup cried out in horror and Sandor gnashed his teeth, battered down the urge to comfort it, to even let it alone. Because it wasn't running. Trembling, shaking, skipping away from him, but not-

"NOW, you little _shit_ -"

Another solid kick and the pup went flying. Landed in a heap of scrambling limbs and ran yelping towards the smell of meat and safety. Sandor watched it flee, limping slightly but to his eyes, not badly. A few hours gnawing on scraps and sleeping under a mound of rib bones would do for him, but just in case he still had any ideas-

"Come one, old man," he bit out through teeth clenched tight, turning and grabbing the stallion's bridle. "Before he gets any stupid ideas."

Sandor felt every tremor and shake as his feet pounded the odd little wasteland behind the butcher's row, back to the brick and stone of Braavos. He supposed this, technically, was Braavos a well, but it seemed lost and forgotten to his eyes. A length of marshland and bubbling bogs that the meat merchants hurled their refuse into, and a city's worth of pests congregated around. His feet sucked and squelched in the mud and he had to yank them out with a twist of his hips more than once, Stranger whinnying in protest as what it thought was ground was, instead, just a pile of soft peat.

"Aye, aye, I'm not fucking happy, either, but it won't be... long..."

In the time it took from one word to get to another, the tone and the man who spoke it changed.

Shadows loomed from around the corner, grew until he could see their shapes and forms. Hear the clank of steel at their hips and in their hands, covering torsos and arms. Smell the stink of grog and watered ale on each man's breath, soaked with dirt and sweat into their shirts. For a moment, his heart froze and when it started again, if you were a maester perhaps, you could have listened close and heard the difference in it.

Slower. Steadier. Resigned as the expression on his face, gone mournful to implacable in and with a word.

A man with a raper's mark grinned at him, and it was not the look of a friend. He was swishing lightly at the ground with his bastard sword, shining brass gauntlet from fingers to shoulder covering his arm. Around him a group-

_eight. short swords, hand axes, maces, two spear, no bows. three behind the cart on your left. the smell worse_

-with their hands filled spread out from a tight knot into a line, unfolding around him until they were a half-circle, a maw, a set of jaws with the men at the end looking to clamp down on a juicy morsel. 

_Either way. Hardly matters now._

"Suppose you thought you'd be seeing us at the tavern, aye?" Hiller's voice slithered through the air with a drunken chuckle-

_most are in their cups. not too much, but enough. twelve of them. probably thought numbers will be enough._

"Well, sad to say, _Donal_ -" The sellsword captain's sneer became a chuckle became a laugh that leaped from scum to scum until the whole group was laughing at him, at the great joke and small name he'd tried to hide behind. Sandor did not move. He breathed slowly, and steadily, and his heart was the same. "I asked some questions and found out something odd. Odd, but profitable. Looks like there's a bounty out for a Westerosi with a scarred face. Horribly burnt. Looks like a side of beef left too long in a fire, and I thought to myself, "Hiller, this is your lucky day. A fat contract and a fat purse of gold for his pretty head, just before we leave"."

The Westerosi blinked and Hiller's smile hesitated just a fraction. Sandor wanted to grin. Morons. Idiots. Fools drunk on more than gutter-brew. Give a man a sword and he thinks he's a killer; give him fellows to hold it around, he thinks he's a mummer, too. In love with his own voice, and perplexed when begging and pleading don't enter his little script like they should. He moved his head from side to side, placed each man in garish garb from Pentos to the Dothraki Sea to Westeros in their place. The three he can't?

_won't be invisible long._

"It'll be quick, at least," Hiller said, stepping forward in the center of the maw, the rest of them moving with him. Advancing through the rain getting steadier above them, the side street deserted save for jackals and hound and horse. "No need to drag it out long-"

Sandor put a sword in his hand, and the beast did more than stir.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoyed, 'cause that will be the last one for a while. College work is heating up and I have a metric fuckton of papers to bang out in the next two weeks. But I'll be around, baby, right round, when you go down down... ;-)


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